Free Republic

Dozens of mourners queued today to pay their respects to former Taoiseach Charles Haughey within minutes of a book of condolence being opened in the heart of his old constituency. Outside. Workers scrambled to repaint railings and touch up the flagpole where the Tricolour flew at half-mast at Our Lady of Consolation Church in Donnycarney, north Dublin. This is where the one-time TD for the area will lie in state before being buried on Friday. Joe Mirolo, 73, from nearby Clontarf was a classmate of Mr Haughey’s at St Joseph’s in Fairview. “We used to meet every year at the...

A secret £320 million payment to bring about a summit between the two Korean nations was not a bribe, but an "expression of brotherly love", said the North yesterday in its first comment on the scandal in the South's capital Seoul. Revelations of the payments by a subsidiary of the South Korean conglomerate Hyundai have led to calls for the former president, Kim Dae-jung, to hand back the Nobel peace prize he was awarded after the summit, and even to be prosecuted. A vote by the National Assembly to order a special inquiry into the payments overshadowed the assumption of...