Posted on 06/15/2010 1:39:06 PM PDT by James C. Bennett
LONDON: British prime minister David Cameron apologized on behalf of his country Tuesday for the 1972 slaughter of 13 Catholic demonstrators in the Northern Ireland town of Londonderry, an outrage that became known as "Bloody Sunday."
In a solemn statement to the British House of Commons, Cameron said that a mammoth, 12-year investigation into the killings left no doubt that the soldiers confronting crowds of Catholic demonstrators in Londonderry's hard-line Bogside district mowed down unarmed protesters without provocation.
"What happened on Bloody Sunday was both unjustified and unjustifiable. It was wrong," Cameron said, as a crowd watching him from Londonderry burst into cheers and applause.
Cameron prefaced his remarks by saying he was a patriot and a strong supporter of the British Army, but said "you do not defend the British Army by defending the indefensible."
He said the 190 million pound ($280 million) report contained "shocking conclusions to read" and that he was "deeply sorry" for what happened.
If the Brits were truly apologetic they would get out of N. Ireland.
Not going to happen.
Amen! I often correct people when they say the Palestinian’s are the longest occupied people because they are not the Irish are.
Agreed. The Brits should have left N. Ireland after WWi, just saying.
Does the report indicate who is responsible for the decision/order to shoot?
If so, are any of them still alive?
If so, if he was truly sorry he would be pushing to try them for murder.
Where are the reparations payments?
The western half of NI is Irish majority, while the Eastern half, except Belfast, is British majority. Maybe they should give Ireland the western half only.
Hey, what about us Picts?
No, give Ireland all of Ireland. Let the Brits live in Britain.
With Guinness being an aphrodisiac the relative birth rates the Catholics will soon have a sufficient voting majority to merge with Ireland.
Not going to happen.
It will happen whether they want it or not. It's just a matter of time.
Demographics has been altered.
And the Irish probably just stole the land from somebody else before then.
People have been stealing land since Adam and Eve, get over it.
You wrote:
“America would be less than half its size if we gave back what we took from the Spanish, the Natives, the Mexicans, etc.”
Bad analogy. 1) There are no Spaniards here (except for Americans of Spanish descent). The Irish on the other hand are in their own native land and are still Irish and always will be. 2) Most of the “Natives” are long since dead. Entire native nations died out. The Irish are still around and they are in their native land. 3) The Mexicans have Mexico - which was not the original owner of any US territory or even the secondary owner of any US territory. Before the Mexicans were a host of native peoples and then the Spanish. The Irish on the other hand were the owners from the beginning of written history and were the owners when the British invaded. They Northern Irish never ceded the territory and have never given up their claim to it.
“Every country has land they took from others long ago. Gee whiz. I know I’m biased because my homies were some of those Scots who took land from the Irish.”
And the Irish will get the land back. It is inevitable.
As long as the protestants keep using birth control at rates higher than Catholics, the trend will continue and Catholics will be a majority by 2050. As it stands right now, the Brits are trying to figure out a way to get out of Ireland without too much violence.
You wrote:
“As it stands right now, the Brits are trying to figure out a way to get out of Ireland without too much violence.”
I don’t think they’re trying to figure a way out. And I don’t thik they’re all that worried about violence either. There was very little violence against Protestants in the south when the Brits left there. Even today the Protestants in the south control many of the financial institutions, industries, etc. If there is violence in the north, it will be because the Catholics have been poorly treated for centuries (with Bloody Sunday an example of such treatment).
I don’t think they’re worried about violence against the protestants. It is the protestant paramilitaries attacking Catholics that they are worried about.
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