Just announced. Thought it would have been more if I'm honest.

https://www.belfastlive.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/watch-royal-mail-postman-incident-33028743

Police are treating an incident in East Belfast involving a Royal Mail postman as a homophobic hate crime.

Ring doorbell footage from the property in Rosebury Gardens appears to show the postman approaching the house to make a delivery before checking that no one was watching and kicking over a rainbow garden gnome and a planter containing a Pride flag.

Speaking to Belfast Live, one of the occupants of the house, who does not wish to be named, explained that she and her fiancée had returned home to the damage and were "astounded" when they discovered it was their postman after reviewing the footage.

“We were absolutely stunned when we checked the Ring footage. You never expect to see your own postman looking around to make sure the coast is clear and then deliberately kicking over your property," she said.

“It wasn’t just a gnome and a planter. It felt like a targeted message, and that’s what has really shaken us.

“There’s no doubt in our minds that this was a homophobic act. These items weren’t in his way. He sought them out and kicked them over on purpose.”

The occupant said that they reported the incident to Royal Mail on Sunday and were told that someone would call them back, but to date, no one has been in touch.

“We reported the incident to Royal Mail straight away and were told someone would be in touch, but we’ve heard nothing since. It’s added to the stress of the whole situation.

"At the very least, we expected a call back, some reassurance, or even an acknowledgement that what happened was unacceptable.

"We are not trying to cause trouble for the sake of it, but we don't want anyone else to go through something like this."

Inspector Adams said: “We received a report at around 11.15am on Sunday, 7th December of a plant pot containing a Pride flag and a garden gnome statue with a rainbow being knocked over at a property in the Rosebery Gardens area.

“It was reported that a man observed at the house at around 3.35pm on Saturday, 6th December, looked at the plant pot before deliberately kicking it over.

“This incident is being treated as a homophobic hate crime and our enquiries are ongoing.

“We would appeal to anyone who was in the area at the time, or who may have any information which could assist with our enquiries – including CCTV or other footage – to contact us on 101, quoting reference number 587 of 07/12/25.

“You can also submit a report or information online using the non-emergency reporting form via www.psni.police.uk/makeareport, or contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or online at www.crimestoppers-uk.org/. ”

A Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We have viewed the footage and referred it to local management for investigation. We take this seriously and are looking into what happened as a priority."

In a further update, they added: "The individual was an agency worker, and their contract assignment has been terminated with immediate effect."

Donald Trump has said he would "love to see" a reunified Ireland, claiming "it will happen eventually".

Speaking to the press during his two-day visit to Ireland, the US president said a unified Ireland would be "a great feather in everyone's cap".

He asked: "How could it be bad?"

Mr Trump had been asked by a reporter for his views on Irish reunification.

Referencing the Irish premier, Micheal Martin, who sat beside him, Mr Trump added: "We're talking about it and you got the right man over here to get it moving.
"But, yeah, I think it would be a fantastic thing."

The US president made his remarks during a meeting with Mr Martin at the Farmleigh Estate in Dublin on Saturday morning.

He doubled down on his comments while speaking at the US ambassador's residence afterwards.

He said: "I actually said it would be, I think, a very cool thing. To be honest with you, I think it would be cool."

Irish President Catherine Connolly, a long-standing critic of the US president, received Mr Trump at her official residence Aras an Uachtarain in Phoenix Park earlier in the day.

Mr Trump arrived in Ireland amid what has been described as one of the biggest security operations ever put in place by the Irish police service.

During his appearance with Mr Martin, Mr Trump said the relationship between Ireland and the US has "never been as good as it is right now".

He described himself and Mr Martin as "friends", and said they "had a great relationship from the beginning".

Mr Trump will later travel across the country to his golf resort in Doonbeg, County Clare, which is hosting the Irish Open.

Earlier this year, UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham sparked a political row on the island of Ireland when he said a unity referendum is "off the table".

Under the terms of the 1998 Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, the UK Northern Irish secretary is obliged to hold a border poll if he believes unification will be supported by a majority of voters.

To effect constitutional change, the people of the Republic of Ireland must also vote in favour.

Republican party Sinn Fein has boycotted the annual St Patrick's day visit to Washington for the last two years over the Trump administration's stance on the Middle East, but Northern Ireland's leading unionist parties, the DUP and UUP, have continued to attend and engage with the US president.

https://news.sky.com/story/trump-would-love-to-see-irish-reunification-and-claims-it-will-happen-eventually-13584741

The south consistently comes out on top when comparing living standards and general wellbeing

Health, education and economic outcomes in the Republic are significantly better than those north of the border, according to a new book that compares official data from the two neighbouring jurisdictions.

Before the Vote: Planning for a United Ireland by Professor John Doyle also highlights how in many sectors the gap between north and south is widening.

The Dublin City University academic’s book has been written in response to what the author describes as an “undeniable groundswell of public interest” in the potential for a border poll over the ten years since the Brexit referendum.

It seeks to redress the “high level of ignorance and misinformation about the comparative economic and public policy frameworks of the two jurisdictions”.

Prof Doyle argues that the public across the island “want a very detailed plan before they vote” in concurrent referendums under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.

“They do not want a repeat of a Brexit- style referendum,” he says, stressing that “preparation for unity referendums needs to begin immediately”.

The first half of the book, which was launched in Belfast on Wednesday night, is dedicated to comparisons between north and south using a number of key indicators that reflect overall living standards and a population’s general wellbeing.

On health outcomes, the data reveals marked differences. For instance, life expectancy for a child born in the Republic in 2020 is 82.4 years, compared to 80.4 years in Northern Ireland, while the infant mortality rate in the north is 4.8 (per 1,000 births) versus 2.8 in the south.

There are also significant differences in waiting lists, regarded as the most public measure of the extent to which a health system is meeting, or not meeting, the needs of the population.

While there are some limitations in comparing data – the author claims different statistical methodology “has the impact of making waiting lists look shorter in Northern Ireland than they really are” – healthcare waiting times over one year are 8.5 times greater north of the border.

The most recent figures quoted show 15.6% of the north’s population were on a hospital outpatient waiting list for longer than 12 months, compared to 1.8% in the south.

The Republic also spends around 20% more per capita on healthcare than the north.

In economic terms, in the years since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the northern economy grew by an average of 1.3% a year compared to the Republic’s 3.2%.

Productivity levels in the south have increased steadily, in real terms, by an average of 0.2% per year, while Northern Ireland’s productivity levels have been falling by an average of 1.2% per year.

“The impact of these very different trajectories over the 20 years following the Good Friday Agreement resulted in productivity per worker in the Republic being approximately 40 per cent higher than in Northern Ireland by 2020,” Prof Doyle writes.

In terms of the comparative standards of living, figures from 2019 show the average standard of living in the Republic 18.3% higher than in Northern Ireland.

Core welfare benefits in the south are more than 60% higher than in the north, while 17% of Northern Ireland’s population (and 25% of children) are living in households below the poverty line, compared to less than 12% of the Republic’s total population (and 14% of children).

The book notes that there is “now a very significant gap in education outcomes between the two jurisdictions”, which directly relate to productivity, investment and wage levels.

It highlights data from 2022 showing that while 93.9% of the post- GCSE/ Junior Certificate age group (15– 19 years of age) were in full-time education in the Republic, this figure was only 70.6% in Northern Ireland.

The book identifies the transfer test, previously the 11+, as “the biggest single cause of poor educational outcomes in Northern Ireland”.

It argues that abolishing the transfer test is “probably the most important step” in increasing the proportion of young people who complete school to A-levels and who go on to formal further education and to university.

“This is necessary for both economic and social inclusion reasons, and the current high level of early school leaving is a major barrier to attracting economic investment,” the author says.

Prof Doyle told The Irish News that in regards to advocating or opposing unification, his book “consciously doesn’t argue one way or the other and doesn’t draw a conclusion in that way”.

“But I think it is clear that in health, education, economics, gender equality, pensions, and welfare, people would be economically better off and have a better health system,” he said.

https://www.irishnews.com/news/northern-ireland/republic-outstrips-the-north-significantly-in-health-education-and-economic-outcomes-U5MHN3PGLZHNHCULWS5TVGM7KU/

https://www.irishnews.com/news/northern-ireland/irish-and-northern-irish-identities-eclipse-british-among-norths-young-people-3ACR7SVURRCS3B653UX74AONKQ/

Irish and Northern Irish identities eclipse British among north’s young people

Young Protestants identifying as Irish rises in latest annual Life and Times survey

The number of young people identifying as Irish and Northern Irish is on the rise, while the British identity has stalled, according to an annual survey.

The number of teen Protestants identifying as Irish is also on the rise, according to the Young People Life and Times Survey 2026, which was published this week.

‘Northern Irish’ has seen the biggest rise in the surveys questions on national identity.

Almost 2,000 16-year-olds took part in this year’s poll, which explores everything from identity to attitudes on issues including crime and education.

With respondents allowed to choose multiple answers, a total of 50% chose ‘Northern Irish’ when asked to describe their national identity.

This was up from 44% last year, and 43% in 2024.

Those choosing ‘Irish’ were at 45%, up from 43% last year, and 42% the year before.

‘British’ respondents were at 23% for this year, the same as last year, and one percent more than in 2024.

For the first time since 2022, more females (46%) than males (43%) are identifying as ‘Irish’. Ten percent of those from a Protestant background ticked ‘Irish’ in the latest survey, up from 8% last year, and 5% in 2024.

Those from a Catholic background identifying as ‘Northern Irish’ has also seen a continued rise – 21% compared to 2025’s 20%, and 18% the year before.

Meanwhile, the number of Catholic background respondents who answered favorably to whether they “feel a sense of belonging” to Northern Ireland has risen to 69%, up from 66% in the previous two years.

However, the number answering ‘yes definitely’ to that question from a Catholic background has fallen to 18% from the 20% of the three years before.

The 2026 survey also revealed more respondents overall would feel safe attending an event at a GAA club (62%) compared to an Orange hall (40%).

Young Life and Times director, Professor Dirk Schubotz, told the Irish News the increase in ‘Northern Irish’ as an identity for young people was in part due to more young Protestants preferring it over ‘British’.

“My interpretation is that the increase in popularity of Northern Irishness as a national identity category has much to do with a decreasing identification with Britishness,” he said.

“I think Britishness has become less popular and more contested, and – looking at Wales and Scotland, but also in other European countries – we can see a strengthening of more local and regional national identifications, perhaps as sign that young people, but also adults, increasingly identify with the uniqueness of their regional areas.

“In NI this is significant for the peace process. More Catholics and Protestant young people identifying with Northern Ireland as a common national identification, and feeling a sense of belonging to NI, can only be a good sign. Again, young people have multiple identifications so in most cases it is Northern Irish as well as British and/or Irish.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/dup-belfast-alliance-party-kneecap-kemi-badenoch-b2816816.html

‘You couldn’t pay for the PR the DUP gives Kneecap,’ band member Naoise O Caireallain told the crowd at Belfast Vital.

By Grinne N. Aodha Friday 29 August 2025 21:32 BST

Kneecap on stage at Belfast Vital on Friday (Liam McBurney/PA)

Rap group Kneecap took aim at the DUP and the Alliance Party as they were given a rapturous welcome back to Belfast by a crowd waving pro-Palestine flags.

The trio’s set on Friday at the Vital festival in Belfast also criticised Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and called for the US military to be kept out of Ireland.

Liam Og O hAnnaidh, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, told the crowd at Boucher Playing Fields: “It’s good to be home”.

“I would like to thank the DUP and the Alliance Party, and their supporters, for trying to cancel this gig,” Naoise O Caireallain, aka Moglai Bap, told the crowd.

“You couldn’t pay for the PR the DUP gives Kneecap.”

“We owe the DUP our career, so this is our public thanks for the DUP,” O hAnnaidh said.

O Caireallain added: “I think the Alliance Party need to look at themselves, if they are on the same side as the DUP there must be something wrong with the Alliance Party.”

It comes after O hAnnaidh appeared in court charged with a terrorism offence relating to allegedly displaying a flag in support of Hezbollah at the O2 Forum in Kentish Town, north London, during a gig in November 2024.

The group said their actions, including the accusation of holding the Hezbollah flag, had been taken out of context and that the case should be thrown out because of a technical error.

O hAnnaidh told the crowd in Belfast on Friday: “I think it’s important as Irish people we stay on the right side of history.

“As we sit here enjoying ourselves, our brothers and sisters in Palestine are enduring a genocide.

“I know I don’t have to lecture you people out there, I see an awful lot of support and I f****** massively appreciate it.”

“The thing is, with whatever platform we have, we feel it’s important to use a few minutes of it at the very least at every single gig to at least draw attention to the ongoing genocide.

“We don’t give a f*** about the repercussions any more. This is bigger than Kneecap.

“Netanyahu is a war criminal. Free Palestine.”

The crowd, wearing Palestine jerseys and keffiyehs, then began chanting “Free Free Palestine”.

Earlier this week, the rappers cancelled a string of US tour dates because of their “proximity” to O hAnnaidh’s next appearance at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on September 26.

O hAnnaidh said: “Not the first Irish man up in a f****** British court for terrorism, allegedly.”

O Caireallain told the crowd: “It’s a pleasure to be back in Belfast. They won’t have us in Hungary, they won’t have us in the US, but they’ll always have us in Belfast.”

They also called on people to “boycott McDonalds”.

The rap group – which is made up of O hAnnaidh, O Caireallain, and JJ O Dochartaigh, aka DJ Provai – are known for their provocative lyrics and championing of the Irish language and a pro-Palestine stance.

Kneecap claim the controversies surrounding the group are part of a smear campaign against them because of their vocal support for Palestine and criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, which they say is a genocide.

They performed to a sea of Palestinian flags during their set at Glastonbury Festival in June, which was initially investigated by police.

Police later said they would be taking “no further action” against the band.

The band, who formed in Belfast and released their first single in 2017, began their set on Friday night with a message on screen that said “Get the US military out of Ireland” and “Free Palestine” before launching into their song Making Headlines.

Man arrested on suspicion of attempted murder following a serious assault in north Belfast

A man in his 30s, believed to be Somalian, has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder following a serious assault involving a knife in the Kinnaird Avenue area of north Belfast on Monday night, 8th June, shortly after 10.30pm.

He remains in police custody. The injured man, aged in his 40s, is in hospital where his condition is described as serious. The attack has left the man with significant injuries to his face, neck and back.

Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson said: “This is a deeply concerning assault and I have declared this a critical incident. We have commenced an investigation to establish a motive.

“This brutal attack will have sent shockwaves through the community causing real concern. I want to reassure the local community that we are treating this attack with the utmost seriousness. Our investigation is continuing at pace. Community safety is our priority and we are currently engaging with local representatives and residents to provide reassurance and support.

"Our officers were on the scene within minutes and we wish to acknowledge the members of the public who strived to save the man from further attack. Their willingness to step forward to help another person shows incredible bravery and community spirit.

"We are also aware of footage circulating online and we would strongly urge members of the public not to share or repost these images. Doing so risks causing further trauma to the injured man’s loved ones and may impact the ongoing investigation. Our thoughts remain with the victim’s family at this deeply distressing time.

“As our investigation continues we will provide further updates.”

Anyone who witnessed this incident, or who may have captured dash-cam or CCTV footage from the area which could help with their investigation, is asked to contact police on the non-emergency number 101, quoting reference number 1654 08/06/26.

A report can be submitted online using the non-emergency reporting form via https://orlo.uk/yC1bK or you can also contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or online at www.crimestoppers-uk.org/.

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/drumcree-deal-offered-as-orange-order-puts-forward-one-and-done-forever-march/a/162555494.html

Drumcree deal offered as Orange Order puts forward ‘one and done’ forever march

Loyalists warn Fleadh could face protests if Garvaghy Road offer rejected

The Orange Order has offered to walk away and never return but only if they secure one last march along the Garvaghy Road. There has been much speculation about the prospect of a “one and done’’ settlement to the Drumcree dispute which is now entering its second week.

It is understood the Order has made it clear they have no intention of returning next year or any future year on the condition they can return their banner to Carleton Street Orange Hall one last time. Senior sources have said it would be the end of the dispute and end the Drumcree march as we know it.

In future years they will make their way into Portadown via a different route.

Up to now residents’ representatives have stood firm on their determination to block the march despite a court ruling allowing a limited body of 35 men and a single banner making their way down the road at 8am.

But Orange Order sources have warned that failure to reach an accommodation to allow one final parade will have significant repercussions for future parades and marches.

Sources have indicated cultural events including next year’s Fleadh could be the target protests and disruption.

“The unionist community will simply ignore the (Parades) Commission, we have seen that Sinn Féin and others believe they are above the law when it comes to blocking lawful parades,” the source said.

“A court sat until two in the morning to declare this parade lawful, what is to stop future disruption of events like the Fleadh being disrupted if it is accepted that you can bring a mob onto the street despite being against the law?”

The source added there was a growing belief among Orangemen that an increasing number of Garvaghy Road residents would look favourably on such a solution.

“They just want this over, we get our banner home and that’s it. The Order will walk away in the knowledge that they secured their lawful right to make the return journey, but will voluntarily walk away,” the source said.

“No more applications to the commission, no more Sunday morning walks to the police line at Drumcree.”

It is understood the scenario has been presented to residents’ representatives but it has so far been rejected and the issue is back before the courts tomorrow, when residents will be seeking to challenge last week’s ruling.

This year’s stand-off has come without the threat of the violence of the past. Loyalist and unionist supporters have heeded calls for no violence.

“Not a stone has been thrown by a single loyalist,” the source said. However, the Drumcree ruling is likely to be the latest in a series of planned legal challenges which could impact on contentious parades in other parts of Northern Ireland.

Security sources have indicated that Chief Constable Jon Boutcher has been impressed by what his commanders have described as the impeccable conduct of the Order and its supporters.

That said, a “major public safety operation” remained in place over the weekend.

The PSNI said it was “continuing to seek safe and peaceful compliance” with the Parades Commission’s decision that the Orange Order parade could go ahead with restrictions.

Northern Ireland Secretary Sir Chris Bryant also called for calm and said “everyone across Northern Ireland wants a peaceful resolution”.

On Wednesday, Boutcher said there would be an investigation after protesters blocked the mainly nationalist road to prevent the parade from happening.

Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson has said the “investigation into anyone suspected of breaking the law related to this dispute is continuing at pace”.

Protesters remain on Garvaghy Road and the Orange Order has maintained a presence at Drumcree Church. There were community events on either side of the divide last night.

Singer Christy Moore is the latest artist to voice his support, sending a musical message of solidarity following the appearance on the road of members of trad band Beoga and the Mary Wallopers who performed in front of residents.

On Friday the Secretary of State said on social media he was “continuing to work to find a mutually acceptable agreement and I’m grateful to everyone who has offered help and has taken part in the discussions so far”.

“My door remains open and I repeat my calls for people to support further compromise,” he added.

“I would especially urge calm this weekend.

“I would also encourage people to ignore calls for more people to come to the area at this time of tension.”

Portadown Orangemen have made a number of attempts to parade down the Garvaghy Road only to be stopped by police at the bottom of Drumcree Hill.

Earlier, the Orange Order’s Portadown District said that its position “has been clear from the outset: we set out to complete our parade through lawful and peaceful means, and despite the provocation and threats we have faced, it remains our firm intention to continue on that path”.

“Our community has demonstrated considerable restraint, dignity and patience, and we strongly encourage everyone to continue conducting themselves lawfully and peacefully.”

DUP leader Gavin Robinson has said there have to be “consequences” for “people who are law makers who are acting as law breakers”. First Minister Michelle O’Neill, Sinn Féin president Mary Lou McDonald and other elected representatives have been ever present on the Garvaghy Road and have faced down calls for their prosecution. “I believe the right thing is to stand on this road,” the First Minister said. “What we can’t see on this road is the return of a triumphalist march that railroads over the rights of this community.” Orangemen and Garvaghy Road residents met Sir Chris Bryant at Hillsborough Castle on Thursday night but did not break their deadlock. Speaking after Thursday night’s talks, Sir Chris told reporters: “I think this is the end of these conversations. “We haven’t come to a settled agreement and it’s a shame but my door remains open.” Breandán Mac Cionnaith, the chairman of the Garvaghy Road Residents’ Coalition, said there had been no “meeting of minds”. Nigel Dawson, the Orange Order’s Portadown district master, said it “remains as it has been”. Hopes of a resolution to the Drumcree dispute have faded but have not disappeared completely. On Friday, former US diplomat Dr Richard Haass told BBC News NI that Northern Ireland had “failed” to come to terms with the legacy of its past. Breandán Mac Cionnaith with Garvaghy residents at Hillsborough Breandán Mac Cionnaith with Garvaghy residents at Hillsborough © Liam McBurney/PA Wire Haass chaired all-party talks in Northern Ireland in 2013 aimed at resolving contentious issues, including parades. He said the flare-up of the Drumcree dispute should be “a bit of a warning shot or a wake-up call”. “I don’t think any of us should take progress for granted. Backsliding is always possible,” he added. More than 200 people from a Protestant background have put their names to a letter to the UK and Irish governments, expressing concern over the dispute. In the letter, they said they were distressed by the “trauma that is being visited on the residents of the Garvaghy Road after 28 years of calm”. The signatories said they recognised that parading was a “valued tradition” for many but they appealed to the Orange Order to “look towards the bigger picture and bring this impasse to an end in the interests of the entire community”.

https://www.irishnews.com/news/northern-ireland/queens-university-confirms-end-to-israeli-investments-HSP4O2RTMRDCHFAJCTPV5756BQ/

By Allan Preston June 06, 2025 at 6:00am BST

QUEEN’S University Belfast has confirmed it is no longer investing in Israeli companies.

It follows an announcement by Trinity College Dublin, which said it will divest from any new arrangements with Israeli universities, firms and institutions.

Pro-Palestinians activists have since called on other Irish universities to do the same in protest against the war in Gaza.

Last May, students at Trinity were fined €214,285 after a series of demonstrations against fees and rent as well as the university’s ties to Israel.

Trinity later dropped the fine, and said it would complete a divestment from Israeli companies with activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and which appear on the UN blacklist.

A Queen’s spokesperson told the Irish News they were no longer investing in Israeli companies as of Thursday.

“In June last year, Queen’s announced it was progressing its divestment from companies blacklisted by the UN Human Rights Council,” they said.

“We can confirm as of today, the University has no direct investment in any Israeli companies. From an academic standpoint, we currently have no institutional research MoUs with Israeli-based partners, there are no direct research partnerships with Queen’s and any institution in Israel, and we have no student exchange programmes with Israel.”

In March, a collective of students and staff from Queen’s organised a march to the US Consulate in Belfast over the United States’ “complicity in the Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza”.

Last November, three students were also arrested during pro-Palestinian protests at Queen’s as the former US first lady Hilary Clinton was visiting.

Patrick Corrigan, Northern Ireland director of Amnesty International, welcomed the announcement and praised student activists and staff “who have made this happen in response to the unfolding genocide in Gaza.”

“We call on all institutions, including Stormont government departments and local councils in Northern Ireland, to cut ties with any entity that profits from or perpetuates war crimes.

“That includes divesting from companies that profit from illegal Israeli settlements and military occupation and ending arms sales to Israel. Human rights are not negotiable.”

Earlier this week, Zoe Lawlor who chairs the Irish Palestine Solidarity Campaign, called the announcement from Trinity a “landmark step in academic rejection of apartheid Israel’s regime”.

“Trinity will now stand on the right side of history, as it did with South African apartheid in the past, but it is nevertheless disappointing that it took so long to get to this position,” she said.

https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/politics/the-troubles-to-become-a-required-part-of-the-curriculum-for-all-northern-irish-schools-8835761

The history of the Troubles is to be put on the Northern Irish school curriculum officially for the first time, the Department of Education has said.

It has prompted Jon Burrows to urge vigilance against “revisionism”, while the TUV has said that paramilitary victims must be put at the centre of the content.

Some schools already cover the Troubles in their teaching, but this move will make it a requirement.

The department said that the new Northern Ireland Curriculum 2028 – which is out for consultation until September 30 – will have a “substantially stronger” focus on the history of the Province’s development than present.

Right now there is a requirement for “a general, high-level reference to the partition of Ireland and how it has influenced Northern Ireland today” at Key Stage 3 level.

But “beyond this there is no legally-mandated content on the history of Northern Ireland” (though it did also add that “the history of Northern Ireland 1968-1998 is also a significant element of the current CCEA GCSE history course and is regularly taught”).

The new curriculum will instead require Key Stage 3 pupils to study “the origins and course of the Troubles, peace processes, and legacies of conflict in Northern Ireland”.

Alongside this, teachers must also cover:

“The creation of Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State;

"Changes and contrasts in the economies, social lives, cultures and identities of Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State until 1945;

"Economic and social challenges, efforts at modernisation, and the expanding role of the state in Northern Ireland after 1945; and

"Ordinary lives in Northern Ireland after 1945.”

A “draft framework” document for the new history curriculum gives a little more detail.

It states that pupils should learn about “how political violence and security measures affected everyday routines, travel and community relations,” for example.

They should also learn about “the search for safety and security and the role of family and neighbourhoods in sustaining daily life,” and about “efforts to create non-sectarian spaces such as the Peace People and the emergence of non-sectarian recreations such as punk”.

The department told the News Letter this will apply to all publicly-funded schools – including Catholic, controlled, and integrated – except for special schools.

Mr Burrows said: “Reform is necessary, but it must be undertaken carefully and correctly.”

He continued: “Pupils should understand the political developments of that period, including the Belfast Agreement and the St Andrews Agreement, as well as the terrible human cost experienced across Northern Ireland.

"However, this history must be taught accurately, sensitively and without revisionism.

"Terrorist organisations from both republican and loyalist backgrounds inflicted death and destruction on our citizens.

"Those actions were unjustified and wrong.

"No curriculum should sanitise terrorism, diminish the suffering of victims or allow contested political narratives to be presented as established fact.”

TUV press officer Sammy Morrison said “it is vital that the voice of victims and the savagery of the terrorist campaign is spelt out”.

In his day, “there was little attention within the curriculum on what the terrorists actually did and the impact they had on communities and individuals”.

“It was possible, for example, to complete the course without realising for example that the IRA largely targeted UDR men when they were off duty,” he said.

"If we are to reform the curriculum, the fact that the terrorists went and shot the postman, the milkman, or the farmer as they went about their day to day jobs it would remove much of the glamour around terrorism which particularly impacts the nationalist community.”

We just had a thread where someone asked if they needed to stockpile.

This will hit Europe terribly hard. The sooner Trump goes the better, although I don't think anyone knows if anything more sane will replace him.

So many of our problems today can be traced back to failures to develop nuclear power, failures to wean off oil faster when alternatives are available, and failures to electrify fast enough.

Things like this are why Europe is in such a state and why until we become energy independent we are going to face such dire political instability, poverty and shortage, as well as continuing to be out-competed by the rest of the world.

White supremacists from all over the island of Ireland seeking ‘romantic’ partners humiliated as profiles leaked worldwide

'Tinder for Nazis' screenshots 1/11

Steven Moore

White supremacists in Northern Ireland looking for love with like-minded people have been exposed after a dating site dubbed Tinder For Nazis' was infiltrated.

Dozens of racists from both sides of the Irish border - 95 percent of them men had signed up to dating site WhiteDate looking for love.

Among the supposedly 'romantic' profile statements from love-seeking racists in Ireland is one man seeking "a lady who has never been soiled by another race and maintained her purity," while another is from a man who's prepared "to do his part" to combat cultural diversity by having loads of white kids.

The WhiteDate profile of a man from Belfast 2/11

WhiteDate claimed to be a “dating platform for white people with traditional European values”, marketing itself as a “counter to woke culture”.

But this week a German ‘hacktivist’ calling herself ‘Martha Root’ livestreamed her infiltration of the site, and in front of a tech conference in Germany posted 8,000 profiles of the loveless racists.

The data has since been downloaded and shared across the internet.

“I infiltrated a racist dating site and made Nazis fall in love with robots,” Root claims.

The left-wing journalist found that the website’s cybersecurity hygiene was so poor that it “would make even your grandma’s AOL account blush”.

“Imagine calling yourselves the ‘master race’ but forgetting to secure your own website – maybe try mastering to host WordPress before world domination,” she said.

Root said she didn’t need to actually ‘hack’ the site as the security was so poor. Instead all it took was a simple URL trick of adding “download-all-users/” to the top-level domain. The hacktivist did all this on stage dressed as the pink Power Ranger as a disguise to protect her identity.

Before most of the profile information was removed, Crime World managed to screenshot some profiles and found revealing details about users’ search for love with like-minded white people.

Race hate profile of WhiteDate member from Belfast 3/11

One WhiteDate user from Black Mountain in Belfast, but pretending to be in the USA, said he’s “looking for a woman who is a lady. One with manners. Grace, style and intelligence”.

Sounds normal enough until the 62-year-old then states: “A lady who has never been soiled by another race and maintained her purity in that regard. Age does not matter to me but part of the reason I am on here is to find a bride willing to have children, in order to stop the destruction of our people.”

Most of the users state they want a ‘traditional’ relationship and family. Several say they were ‘redpilled’ – a term born from the Matrix films and used by the far right to explain how they had a political awakening.

The WhiteDate profile of a woman in Moy, Co. Tyrone 4/11

One woman – a 56-year-old from Moy, Co Tyrone, who joined in 2020, states: “I joined to learn more about the internet and the white single community in my area. This is my first foray into racially exclusive dating, but I’m thrilled to begin!”

A man from Bangor, Co Down, who joined the site six years ago says on his profile: “I’m a normal lad from Northern Ireland. Joined this to try and escape the mind numbing brainwashing that surrounds people. Seeing the state of England our sister state is what redpilled me. Northern Ireland has so far escaped the globalism hell hole being created, but the future isn’t bright yet.”

A WhiteDate man from Dublin who wants to create white kids 5/11

Meanwhile, a 24-year-old from Dublin reveals he started listening to “Burzum and other Aryan music this year,” before going deeper into the far right world online.

He says: “I joined to find a traditional wife to create white offspring to save our superior race as it can’t die out. I’m concerned as white birth rates are dropping while African and Asian birth rates are rapidly increasing.”

The WhiteDate profile of a man in Kilkenny 6/11

Meanwhile in County Louth it’s a wonder why the following 28-year-old user from Dundalk has struggled to find love when you read his honeyed romantic views of women he’s met so far.

“Not much to describe just an average male who aligns himself to traditional values and cultural heritage and race since other dating apps have been a dead end of neo-liberalism whores who’s varied promiscuous desires, my only choice was left to come check this out hoping to find a least decent women who hasn’t fallen to this poison yet.”

A WhiteDate member from Galway 7/11

Another Dublin WhiteDate user, who’s just 18, says he “has a strong sense of white identity… I am also a Norse Pagan and am looking for someone who Hails and worships the Gods of our ancestors”.

A WhiteDate profile of a man in Kerry 8/11

Meanwhile out in Listowel, Co Kerry, there’s a 33-year-old man looking for love with a woman “who shares his beliefs and values” and sees it as his duty to produce white kids.

“I do feel that whites are being replaced all over Europe… it would be irresponsible of me to not want to try and do my part and to try and find the right woman who I could start a family with.”

He adds he’s “never had a serious relationship with a woman”.

A WhiteDate profile from Limerick 9/11

Martha Root created a website okstupid.lol, where 8,000 leaked profiles are placed on the map, exposing users from very different regions of the world.

The data includes highly sensitive and detailed self-reported information such as usernames, gender, age, location, activity history, lifestyle, height, eye colour, hair colour, and other physical appearance traits, income range, education, marital status, religion and even self-assessed IQ.

A WhiteDate profile from Dublin 10/11

Notably, the dataset also contains numerous profile photos along with embedded EXIF metadata that reveals precise GPS coordinates, device information, timestamps and other identifying details.

The researcher claims that the image metadata “practically hands out home addresses”.

The WhiteDate profile of a man from Cork 11/11

The administrator of WhiteDate confirmed the hack on their social media account and vowed “repercussions”.

The WhiteDate X profile wrote: “At min 43, they publicly delete all my websites while the audience rejoices.

“This is cyberterrorism. No wonder some of them hide their faces.

“But we will find them, and trust me, there will be repercussions.”

Link https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/tinder-for-nazis-racist-love-seekers-in-ni-have-details-exposed-online/a99557590.html

No paywall https://archive.ph/DcUUT

https://www.thejournal.ie/ballymena-slurry-6746206-Jun2025/ Ballymena streets 'spread with slurry overnight' ahead of town's first Pride parade

SLURRY HAS SEEMINGLY been spread on streets in Ballymena and shopfronts have allegedly been vandalised with spray paint ahead of a Pride parade that is due to take place in the Co Antrim town this afternoon.

Business owners this morning opened their shutters on Ballymoney Street and Greenvale Street, close to the Town Centre shopping centre, to find that slurry had been spread up and down the roads overnight.

Family-owned businesses and their staff are currently cleaning up the mess ahead of the town’s first ever Pride parade this afternoon, which was due to finish up on Greenvale Street.

“It’s awful,” one Greenvale shop owner told The Journal. “It’s all up the lampposts as well.”

Local SDLP councillor Denise Johnston wrote on X: “I am hearing that the town centre in Ballymena has been spread with slurry overnight ahead of the town’s first Pride rally. The local businesses are currently cleaning it up.”

“I am disgusted by those bigots who would commit such an act and hope they will have been caught on CCTV,” she added.

Nicole, a manager of the K&G McAtamney Butchery & Deli on Ballymoney Street, said that when workers arrived at the car park this morning there was slurry the whole way from there to the butchers.

“It’s all around the town from Ballymoney street to here, and it’s particularly bad on Greenvale Street,” she said. “The vendors here have been out all morning getting involved in cleaning it, including our workers.”

Shop owners have reported the incident to the police, it is understood. The Journal has asked the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) for a comment on the matter.

Nicole told The Journal: “We don’t understand what would compel somebody to do this and for it to coincide with our first pride event, which is a positive thing bringing people into the town, is just vile.”

“We’re halfway up the street cleaning it now, and it’s been all hands on deck, but it’s been deeply unpleasant for our staff, and of course our customers.”

Ballymena made headlines around the world after three nights of rioting earlier this month in which over 40 PSNI officers were injured.

PSNI said the rioting erupted after a vigil to protest the alleged sexual assault in the town was “hijacked” by “racist thuggery”.

Curtis Lee, the organiser of the Pride parade in Ballymena which will take place this afternoon, told The Journal: “The committee’s opinion was that, no matter what, we’re going ahead with this because to cancel would be to give into fear.”

There will be protests today from four evangelical Christian groups. One of the four groups protesting is United Christian Witness, and the other three are local church groups.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yjdpy7vvro

The UK government has lost its appeal over a terror charge against a member of the Irish language rap trio Kneecap.

Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh, known as Mo Chara, had been accused of showing support for proscribed organisation Hezbollah following a gig in London in 2024.

Last year, the case was thrown out over a legal timing issue, but the government appealed this decision. On Wednesday, judges at the High Court in London said the 28-year-old would not face a new terror trial after it rejected a Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) appeal.

The judgement, which was published digitally by Lord Justice Edis and Mr Justice Linden, external, said it agreed with the chief magistrate's previous ruling that the charge against Ó hAnnaidh had been brought outside the six-month time limit.

Ó hAnnaidh was first charged in May 2025 after allegedly displaying a flag in support of Hezbollah during a gig at the O2 Forum in Kentish Town in London in November 2024.

Hezbollah are a Shia Muslim political and military group in Lebanon which has been involved in a series of violent conflicts

Chief Magistrate Paul Goldspring outlined in his judgement last September that permission was not given to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) to consent to the prosecution until 22 May – a day after Ó hAnnaidh was charged.

If 22 May was considered to be the date of the charge, that was six months and one day after the London gig where the offence allegedly took place.

The judgement on Wednesday said it agreed with the magistrate that proceedings had "been instituted when the first written charge was issued on 21 May".

"This was invalid as the permission of the Attorney General had not been obtained at that time," the judgement stated.

"It follows that no written charge was issued within 6 months of 21 September 2025 and the judge was right to hold that he had no jurisdiction to try any summary only offence alleged to have been committed on that date."

Who are Kneecap?

Kneecap are an Irish language trio, formed in 2017 by three musicians who go by the stage names of Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí.

Over the years, the group have faced criticism for their provocative lyrics and merchandise.

Their rise to fame inspired a semi-fictionalised film starring Oscar-nominated actor Michael Fassbender.

The group go by the stage names of (L-R) Mo Chara, DJ Próvaí and Móglaí Bap

The self-titled film won a British Academy of Film Award (Bafta) in February 2025.

After their performance at the US music festival Coachella in April 2025, the group were criticised for displaying messages about the war in Gaza during their set.

The comments later led to the BBC deciding not to livestream the group's Glastonbury set. Their set led to an investigation by Avon and Somerset Police, but it later decided no further action would be taken.

In November 2024, the group won its case against the UK government over a decision the then-UK Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch took to withdraw an arts grant.

https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-16215957/Jeffrey-Donaldson-confident-conned-jury-believed-walk-free-reveal-new-life-planned-wife-Eleanor-Africa.html

Paywall-free: https://archive.ph/srw1R

JILLY BEATTIE

Published: 22:38 BST, 16 October 2026

Nineteen kilometres from Jeffrey Donaldson’s prison cell, down a quiet hedge-lined road, a For Sale sign stands outside a tidy country house.

It was home to Jeffrey and Eleanor Donaldson for 22 years. It was his haven, the place he could retreat from his lies, where he welcomed guests and friends from the church, politics and business under the well-worn cloak of respectability. The place where his 40-year con could carry on unquestioned.

The house is now on the market, possibly to help pay legal bills. But just months after he was charged with child sex abuse crimes including rape, Donaldson had already decided to sell up as soon as the case was over. He would leave Northern Ireland for good, and he intended to take Eleanor with him.

The predator politician believed he could con a jury the way he had conned friends, the church, parties and constituencies, and the country.

So with the help of trusting friends, he created a way out: a fresh start in North Africa, amongst contacts he had made through his political career.

One said: ‘I just couldn’t believe he was guilty. I’d trusted him in business and in friendship and during the two years before he went to trial I met him at his house regularly. I believed every word and I helped him, supported him and prayed with him. He convinced me that he would be found not guilty but that life in Northern Ireland would be over for him. He needed to start afresh and he was excited about it. I helped him secure a very lucrative job and he was in discussion about the possibility of others in North Africa. Friends there offered him a hand of friendship and support.

‘The plan was to leave Newry court, enjoy a holiday, get the house ready for market, sell up and head overseas to his new CEO job. I never doubted him for a moment. I felt sorry for him. And I, like others, offered him help where I could. He had a choice of luxury apartments waiting and he was planning a life in the sun when the ordeal was over, far away from the accusations and the doubt they would tarnish him with.’

He never got there.

Unknown to Donaldson and his small entourage, his downfall was already under way, and it had begun with a baby: tiny, helpless, with no sense of the world, but nonetheless the power to change it.

Her arrival became a reckoning, a moment that set something unseen in motion: a question in her mother’s heart, a devastating realisation that what she had thought was attention, had in fact been abuse, and a box prised open that could never be closed. What followed in time, and with great courage, was eventually and cautiously a meeting with police. Then a report and backing from the North’s Public Prosecution Service. Then a trial. A verdict and sentencing. A maelstrom that would sweep away Donaldson’s knighthood, his party, his reputation and, finally, his freedom.

And all of it followed from the first cry of that little baby.

Her mother had been abused by Jeffrey Donaldson when she was a little girl. Decades later she would become known in court as Complainant A, and now, after his conviction, as Victim A. Her personal statement, released to the media on October 15, revealed the horrors she had hidden from for many years.

She revealed that as she looked at her child, she had felt something rise in her that would not be put back down: a fierce, overwhelming need to keep this little one safe. She said: ‘I remember thinking how much I wanted to protect her and how I just felt this overwhelming sense that I had to keep her safe.’

And then came the question that would, in the end, bring down Jeffrey Donaldson. ‘Why was I not kept safe?’

Once she had asked it, she could not stop asking the questions. ‘I couldn’t box them away any more. I couldn’t ignore them.’

This baby gave her mother the strength to do what a knighthood, a seat at Westminster, the Privy Council and the leadership of a political party had kept buried for decades. She gave her the strength to tell the truth.

Over decades, Jeffrey Donaldson had preyed on little girls.

Decades later, it was another little girl who unwittingly set his victims free to put him behind bars. At Donaldson’s sentencing hearing at Newry Crown Court on Thursday, October 15, he sat in the dock motionless. Appearing in court for the third time since he was convicted, he wore a blue suit, white shirt and €250 pink and blue Hermes tie. His face remained passive.

To his left sat his victims, in court in person as they had been for the hearing on September 25, flanked by the police and members of the PPS who had supported and driven the case to a unanimous verdict on all 18 charges of child sex abuse.

The women remained unnamed, protected in law by anonymity and by the letters applied to them in court: Complainant A and Complainant B, now Victim A and Victim B. During the trial, they had been two faces on a screen above a judge, two voices carried into court on a video link. Two women whose names the law forbids anyone to print.

On Thursday, after their abuser was jailed for 15 years, they refused to be letters any longer. ‘I’m not just Complainant A or Complainant B,’ one of them said. ‘I’m a person.’

‘We’ve been known as A and B,’ said the other, ‘but we’re real people with real lives.’

In personal statements released after the sentencing hearing, they revealed their strength and vulnerability, their determination, and their wish to keep Donaldson as far away from them as possible now that the truth has been exposed.

What they said, in stark, unflinching and at times almost unbearable detail, had never been heard before. Those who followed the court reports and broadcasts may have thought they understood what he had done to them. They did not come close. Now the women have explained.

Victim B was seven or eight when it began and in secondary school when it finally ended. She explained how she has spent the rest of her life living with what was done to her. ‘It’s affected every relationship, every possible relationship, every situation,’ she said. She walks into rooms and reads them for danger. Could somebody move towards her? Could a situation turn? Even nights out, even boyfriends. All of it has been filtered through the question of what might go wrong.

‘So then you just block yourself up from life,’ she said. ‘It’s like you’re living your life looking through a window, because you can never fully get involved or connect to it.’ In June she told the court that as a damaged little girl who played with a yellow toy truck, she had told an imaginary friend what was happening, because there was no one real to tell and she did not have the words.

Now, as a grown woman, she has explained exactly what that silence felt like.

I didn’t read newspapers when I was seven or eight years old to know what was happening. You’re going from colouring in to that, and there’s no context. You don’t even know the word context back then. You just know that there’s something horribly wrong that makes you want to just be sick every day.’

She knew it was wrong ‘on so many levels’. But given her abuser’s prestige in the community, she did not know who to go to.

And so today her message, more than anything, is for the children it is happening to right now. She wants them given the words she never had: a way to tell, perhaps even a code word, something that will trigger action, protection.

‘We have rallies across the world about so many things. When have we ever had a rally to say that this was wrong?’

Victim A was also seven or eight when Donaldson turned his attention to her. The abuse went on until she was 13 or 14, again from primary school into secondary school.

She said: ‘You’re very easily controlled and manipulated and I think that was a thing that’s played out for most of my life.’

As a child, she said, she wanted to trust the adults she came into contact with, to believe that the decisions they made for her were right and that she was safe. But when Donaldson was in the same vicinity, she was not safe. And she has spent her adult life struggling to trust anyone.

When at one point she found the courage to confide in someone, she was left devastated. ‘I felt I wasn’t believed and if I was believed, I was made to feel that it wasn’t worth taking action over.’

She internalised that.

‘I wasn’t worth protecting. I wasn’t worth caring about. And that’s something I have struggled with for a really long time, feeling that I’m not worth protecting.’

Into adulthood she carried it with her. ‘At times I felt very low self-worth, believing that I’m not worthy of love, that my voice is not important.’

For so long, she said, she was told she would never be believed ‘because of who he was.’ So she survived the only way she knew. She remained quiet. She put everything into a box in her mind, closed it, and put on a brave front. She threw herself into work, family, friendships. For almost 20 years that box stayed shut. She doubted herself so much that she wondered if she had imagined it, or dreamt it.

Then she found love: a man to talk to, a confidante and friend, her champion, support and a faithful protector. And she started opening up.

But in the end it was their baby girl, and the question she could not stop asking as she held her, that prised that box right open and let the truth out.

The other thing that drove her, she said, was her faith. She believed she had a responsibility to shine a light on the darkness, to expose the secrets, ‘to finally shine a light into that dark corner’.

Hers was the kind of faith that demanded the truth be told. Donaldson’s was a badge, a trinket on his lapel, a passport to power and politics, a hollow promise.

Telling the police, she said, was like opening that box and suddenly feeling everything she had hidden for two decades. It was agonising. But it brought a profound relief: the truth was no longer hers alone to carry.

Then came the onslaught that neither woman could have prepared for. The arrest of a former DUP leader was the biggest story in the country. Everyone had a theory, an opinion, and the two women at the centre of it had to sit and listen.

Victim A revealed she had been in a hairdresser’s when everyone around her was talking about the case. She had been in a coffee shop with her husband and children when the people at the next table began discussing it.

Victim B had heard it at work. Every time something came on the radio or another article appeared, she heard strangers talking about the details as if they had lived through every moment of pain and distress, as if they knew the people involved.

‘That is my life that you’re talking about,’ she said. ‘People know more about me than the closest people in my life.’

And neither woman could say a word.

‘You never know who’s listening,’ said Victim A. ‘Friends, neighbours, colleagues at work. There are victims everywhere.’

Victim B said she sought anonymity for one reason above all: ‘I never wanted my name to be associated with him for the rest of my life.’

Despite Donaldson’s repeated denials, the jury heard the truth, and Judge Paul Ramsey was clear about where the blame for the victims’ trauma in court lies. The hurtful allegations they faced in court, that they were lying or mistaken, were, he said, entirely the doing of the defendant.

In sentencing Donaldson this week, Judge Ramsey was efficient, direct, clear and without hesitation. He said Donaldson had been brought to justice only through the courage, resourcefulness and determination of two young women.

And he described a breach of trust ‘of the gravest kind,’ and a prolonged campaign of sexual abuse against young children across two sustained periods. He found that the rape of Victim B, when she was nine or ten and Donaldson was 25 or 26, was not a spontaneous act but involved a degree of preparation. He said the abuse of Victim A had been committed in a brazen fashion.

Culpability, he said, was high. Harm was high. Risk of reoffending was medium. Donaldson’s lawyers had argued that his lack of previous relevant convictions should count in his favour. The judge rejected that outright. A clean record, he said, is a neutral factor, not mitigation.

Then he turned to the denial.

Donaldson had denied the offences to police. He denied them in the witness box. He denied them to the probation officer who prepared his pre-sentence report, and told her he intends to appeal.

Judge Ramsey said: ‘He has doubled down in his denials. There has not been and doubtless will not be one word of regret, apology or shame from this man to at least provide his victims with some crumb of comfort.’

Inside the courtroom, the atmosphere felt like a vacuum, the air being sucked out, emotions in turmoil in the public gallery, journalists making notes, trying not to look at the victims, the barristers staring straight at the judge and then

Donaldson on his feet, hands clasped, motionless. Judge Ramsey addressed him directly: ‘Jeffrey Mark Donaldson, you are now 63 years of age, it is well known that you in the course of your political career have reached the very heights of public office and this is on any view a catastrophic descent into disgrace. You have persistently denied these offences and continue to do so but you have been found guilty by a jury and it is now my duty to sentence you for these crimes.’

For the offences against Victim B, one count of rape and nine of indecent assault, he imposed 11 years. For the offences against Victim A, four of indecent assault and four of gross indecency, he imposed four years, to run consecutively.

‘The important factor is to arrive at a global figure that properly reflects your offending.’

Fifteen years in total.

Judge Ramsey continued:’I believe that this sentence reflects the culpability of the accused and the harm that he has caused and is commensurate with the gravity of the case as a whole.’

Fifteen years sounds like a long time. But it is not what he will serve.

Including the 116 days he has already spent on remand, the former DUP leader will serve seven and a half years before his release, which is automatic. Because all of his crimes were committed before April 2009, previous rules apply, and under them, prisoners receive automatic 50 per cent remission.

Unless he loses remission for breaking prison rules, Jeffrey Donaldson could walk out of HMP Maghaberry days before Christmas 2033.

He will be 71.

No parole board will decide whether he is safe to release. No panel will ask him to accept what he did. Maintaining his innocence is not a breach of prison rules, so it cannot cost him a single day.

His continued denial has not gone entirely unanswered. Judge Ramsey refused to impose a custody probation order, citing his medium risk of reoffending and his continued denial. When he is released he will be on licence, liable to recall. He will be on the Sex Offenders Register for life. A Sexual Offences Prevention Order will follow him for ten years after his release. But the one thing both women hoped for, they feel he will never give them.

‘There was always some hope in this process that that would change,’ said Victim A. ‘And I never gave up hope. But I have accepted that he continues to deny what he has done. That’s not stopping me. It’s not stopping my voice.’

Victim B had a direct message for Donaldson: ‘You have to just accept that what you did was wrong.’

But in the end, for Victim A at least, this week was about something bigger than Jeffrey Donaldson and his predatory lies and abuse. It was about liberty, it was and life and living.

‘Today with this sentencing, I feel hope that there is a life ahead for my family and I outside of this,’ she said. ‘That this will not dictate our lives any more. There’s a freedom with that.’

Right which one of you did it?? A family member just got notified by the kids primary school in Belfast that they received a “security - related communication” this morning and so the kids are having to evacuate and the school close today. Who in their right fcking mind is phoning in threats to primary schools and threatening kids?!

Suzanne Breen

Political Editor

DUP MP Carla Lockhart has quit her position as a party officer.

The Upper Bann politician’s resignation could be the start of a chain of events leading to her resignation from the DUP.

She has been on a collision course with party leader Gavin Robinson over Drumcree. Ms Lockhart believes that he should withdraw Emma Little-Pengelly as deputy First Minister and collapse the Executive.

The DUP leader has so far refused to do so but said it cannot be “business as usual” at Stormont in light of the Drumcree dispute.

Ms Lockhart has been an MP for seven years. With a 7,500 majority, her seat isn’t seen to be at risk regardless of her party status.

She could join the TUV but, although she has a strong relationship with Jim Allister and his party, it is believed she would sit as an independent if she left the DUP.

Sources said that relations between Ms Lockhart and Mr Robinson haven’t been good for some time. Opinion in the DUP is split on the stance she has taken.

Some insiders accuse her of being “selfish” and endangering party unity, while others praise her robust stance which they say is in keeping with the feeling among grassroots unionists.

Earlier, Ms Lockhart wouldn’t be drawn on whether she has confidence in the DUP leader, and she didn’t rule out leaving the party over the Drumcree dispute.

Asked on BBC Northern Ireland’s Nolan Show about her current relationship with Mr Robinson, she said “no one speaks for me” and that she is “no shrinking wallflower”.

When questioned on whether she would leave the DUP, Ms Lockhart said she wasn’t going to have the discussion on a radio programme.

“People are obsessed with the internal workings. I speak for myself. I have very clear opinions and views and I will always seek to represent those in the best way I can. Whatever discussions need to be had, I’m not having those on the airwaves,” she said.

When asked directly if she had confidence in Mr Robinson, Ms Lockhart added: “I have confidence that the unionist people want action. I have confidence that action is needed and wanted.

“I am not going to get into the intricacies of the internal workings of the DUP. I have confidence that all elected representatives from a unionist persuasion, including Gavin, know exactly how frustrated and angry unionism is in regards to the behaviour of Michelle O’Neill.”

Ms Lockhart said the DUP needed to bring down the Executive. “People are angry that we have a self-proclaimed ‘First Minister for all’ in office who is currently under investigation for law-breaking,” she said.

“She’s certainly not a First Minister that I would accept. That law-breaking has to have, yes, criminal sanctions, but also political as well.

“Unionists I believe are at the end of their tether with regards to Michelle O’Neill’s behaviour.”

The Upper Bann MP demanded that the Secretary of State spells out what was meant by the PSNI saying it was considering the feelings of the Provisional IRA in an intelligence document.

“What I have clearly asked the Secretary of State for is a new assessment of the [IRA’s] existence, an assessment of their activity, and also the potential links to Sinn Féin,” she said.

Sir Chris Bryant intervened after a two week standoff over the Parades Commission’s original decision to approve a controversial march down Portadown’s nationalist Garvaghy Road on September 27 for the first time since 1998.

The march was prevented from going ahead after a large crowd of people including Ms O’Neill blocked the road.

The DUP has been contacted for comment.

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/politics/mp-carla-lockhart-quits-as-party-officer-in-move-which-could-lead-to-her-leaving-dup/a/163487580.html

www.rte.ie/news/courts/2026/0323/1564745-stephen-mccullagh-court/

The boyfriend of Natalie McNally has been found guilty of her murder.

Stephen McCullagh, aged 36, of Woodland Gardens in Lisburn will now face a life sentence.

He had been accused of murdering his 32-year-old girlfriend Natalie McNally in her home in Lurgan, Co Antrim, at Christmas 2022.

She was 15 weeks' pregnant with his child.

Family members hugged each other, cheered and cried when the verdict was delivered.

The jury of six men and six women returned a verdict after two hours of deliberation.

The public gallery at Belfast Crown Court was packed for the verdict.

It was delivered after 18 days of evidence in the high-profile case.

Stephen McCullagh had denied the murder

The prosecution had made the case that McCullagh had beaten, strangled and stabbed his former partner after discovering messages she had sent to other men.

During the trial the jury had heard how Ms McNally had been messaging other men, including a former boyfriend, during her relationship with McCullagh.

The trial heard how McCullagh had pre-recorded a six-hour video of himself gaming several days before the murder.

The prosecution told the jury McCullagh had then published that to his YouTube channel at 6pm on Sunday 18 December 2022, presenting it as a live event.

It said he had used the window afforded by the recording to travel from Lisburn to Lurgan by bus to carry out the murder.

The prosecution claimed that McCullagh had taken a taxi from Lurgan back home after the killing.

It said he had been forced into that position because he had missed the last train which he had intended to take.

Tracking data from the taxi company showed that the taxi had pulled up outside the house in Lisburn where McCullagh lived.

The driver gave evidence that his passenger had gone into the house to get cash for the fare.

McCullagh claimed it was part of an attempt by the real killer to frame him for Ms McNally's murder.

The trial had been told that McCullagh insisted a former boyfriend of Ms McNally's had been responsible for the crime.

https://www.belfastlive.co.uk/news/belfast-news/belfast-stabbing-victim-drugged-set-34103538

Belfast stabbing victim 'drugged and set on fire' by gang leader in previous attack

Stephen Ogilvie, the victim of a Belfast stabbing on Kinnaird Avenue, was attacked by convicted Ulster gang leader David McLeave at a flat in Livingston in 2001 Ruth Suter

12:51, 11 Jun 2026

A victim of a violent attempted murder attempt in Belfast this week had previously been drugged and set alight by an Ulster gang boss at a flat in Livingston.

Stephen Ogilvie, who has connections to Scotland, was assaulted by David McLeave at the West Lothian property in 2001. Mr Ogilvie, 44, had relocated from Belfast to Scotland to stay with McLeave but was attacked by the drug dealer while watching television.

McLeave, who was 21 at the time, administered the date rape drug GBH to Mr Ogilvie before stripping him naked, dousing him in aftershave and setting him ablaze. Vulnerable Mr Ogilvie, who is believed to have learning difficulties, subsequently regained consciousness to discover his body engulfed in flames.

The horrific attack was filmed by his attackers. He subsequently escaped back to Belfast.

McLeave received a 14-year prison sentence at the High Court in Edinburgh in April 2003. His criminal associates, Paul Campbell, then aged 20, Thomas Irvine, 21, Edward Lindsay, 23, and 21-year-old Lee Kingham, were imprisoned for drug offences, reports the Daily Record.

Following his return to Belfast, Mr Ogilvie informed the court how he was in fear for his life after being forced into a vehicle by McLeave's associates Barry and Paul Campbell.

Campbell's brother Barry, 21, was also imprisoned for six years for his role in kidnapping frightened Mr Ogilvie and possessing an unlicensed rifle.

At the time, Mr Ogilvie told the court: "I am terrified and my nerves are shattered."

Mr Ogilvie is currently receiving treatment in hospital for severe injuries sustained during a brutal knife assault on Kinnaird Avenue in Belfast on Monday evening. His condition remains critical, with doctors working to treat extensive wounds, including the loss of one of his eyes. David McLeave attacked Stephen Ogilvie at a flat in Livingston in 2001 View 2 Images

David McLeave attacked Stephen Ogilvie at a flat in Livingston in 2001

Hadi Alodid, aged 30, has appeared before Belfast Magistrates' Court facing charges of attempted murder. The Sudanese national also faces accusations of threatening to kill an NHS radiographer and knife possession.

Speaking through an Arabic interpreter, he declined legal representation and offered no response when the charges were read to him. Alodid, whose address is listed as Duncairn Avenue in Belfast, has been remanded into custody.

It is believed Mr Ogilvie was acquainted with his alleged attacker and had been assisting him as he adjusted to life in a residential building they both lived in within the city.

Police revealed additional information on Tuesday about Alodid's immigration background and route to the UK. He entered Northern Ireland through the Irish border in February 2023, having travelled to Dublin from Paris by air.

Following his arrival, he submitted an asylum application and was granted permission to stay in the UK until 2028 in September 2023. Detectives have established that there is no indication the Monday stabbing was connected to terrorism. Article continues below

In a statement issued through Independent Councillor Stafford Ward, Mr Ogilvie's family said: "We are completely devastated by the horrific attack on our loved one on Kinnaird Avenue. This has been a massive shock to our whole family, and right now, our only priority is being at his bedside and helping him recover."

Harry Potter author JK Rowling has said she is willing to “help with legal costs” after an event organised by the Women’s Rights Network group was cancelled by Féile an Phobail.

The west Belfast festival organisers posted a public statement on social media saying the Respect, Rights & Reality event, which was part of the Féile programme, had been withdrawn as it was “promoting campaigns against rights for the transgender community”.

However, the Women’s Rights Network issued a statement saying they were “shocked and deeply disappointed” by the decision.

Now JK Rowling has waded into the row, replying on X to the Women’s Rights Network that she “will help with legal costs”.

Yesterday, Féile issued a statement about the event, writing: “An event application was submitted to this year’s Féile programme by a group called the Women’s Rights Network.

The statement on Facebook 

“Féile an Phobail was unaware from the initial submission that this event would promote campaigns against rights for the transgender community.

“Féile an Phobail takes pride in standing up for those who are marginalised and attacked.

“Féile was formed in 1988 at a time when the community of west Belfast was being attacked and demonised, and as a positive response to that demonisation.

“In recent years Féile has organised discussion events with the transgender community, providing a platform to raise issues of pressing concern, and we fully support the right of the Transgender community to be treated with equality and respect.

“On that basis, Féile an Phobail has informed the organiser of this event that we are withdrawing their event.

“This event is no longer part of the Feile programme.”

The Northern Ireland Women’s Rights Network is described as a cross-community volunteer organisation and on their website say they are dedicated to defending the “sex-based rights of women and girls through advocacy, education, and community engagement.”

Several people took to social media to express their upset at the group’s original involvement in the festival.

Others defended the original inclusion of the event and said they were “absolutely appalled” by the cancellation.

A statement from the Women’s Rights Network said: “Women’s Rights Network Northern Ireland is shocked and deeply disappointed that Féile an Phobail has cancelled our event, Respect, Rights & Reality, after previously accepting it into this year’s programme.

“Our event was a discussion on women’s sex-based rights. That was made clear to Féile when our application was submitted.

“This decision follows an organised online campaign against the event. That campaign included misogynistic, abusive and, in our view, threatening rhetoric directed at women associated with it. No organisation that values free speech should allow intimidation to determine which voices are heard.

“Féile describes itself as a festival of the people, of ideas, culture and debate. We therefore have to ask whether its commitment to free speech extends only to viewpoints with which it agrees and only to some people.

“Through this event women have sought to discuss their own rights. Feile has chosen to silence the voices of the very group that makes up half the population. Women are not a fringe interest group. We are half the population.

“Women advocating for their sex-based rights are not campaigning against the rights of others. We reject any attempt to misrepresent either our organisation or the purpose of this event.

“We remain committed to ensuring this important discussion takes place.

“This decision will not silence women.”

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/area/west-belfast/news/jk-rowling-says-she-will-help-with-legal-costs-after-feile-an-phobail-cancels-womens-rights-network-event-over-anti-trans-concerns/a/159011841.html

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/area/east-belfast/news/tributes-paid-after-man-dies-falling-from-east-belfast-bonfire/a/158597702.html

Tributes have been paid to a man who died in a “tragic accident” after falling from a Belfast bonfire last night.

Its understood that Warren “AKA” Lyttle passed away yesterday evening at around 1am following the incident at the east Belfast pyre.

In a statement posted online, Braniel Bonfire committee, Braniel Loyal Flute Band and Braniel community group said: “Our thoughts, prayers and deepest sympathies are with Warren’s family, friends and everyone who knew and loved him at this incredibly difficult time.

“As a community, we are heartbroken by this tragic loss and ask that everyone keeps his loved ones in their prayers in the days and weeks ahead.”

The statement added that the bonfire will be lit tonight after organisers spoke to the man’s family and said there would be a minute’s silence.

“Following discussions with Warren’s family, they have expressed their wish for the bonfire to proceed as planned. After careful consideration, we have decided to honour their request,” the statement added.

“The bonfire will be lit at 9:00pm on Saturday 11th July. We respectfully ask everyone attending to join us in observing a minute’s silence in Warren’s memory before the bonfire is lit.

“We also ask that, once the bonfire has been lit, everyone pays their respects by dispersing quietly and respectfully afterwards.

“We would ask all those attending to show dignity, compassion and respect for Warren’s family and friends throughout the evening. May Warren rest in peace, and may his family find strength and comfort in the love and support of those around them.”

Meanwhile, friends of the man have also paid tribute online, with one person writing online: “Condolences to Warren’s family after last night’s accident at Braniel bonfire.”