The Troubles Totally Explained

Everything about The Troubles totally explained

The Troubles was a period of conflict involving Republican and Loyalist paramilitary organisations, political activist and civil rights groups, the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), the British Army and others in Northern Ireland from the late 1960s until the Belfast Agreement of 10 April 1998. The Troubles have been variously described as terrorism, ethnic conflict, a many-sided conflict, a guerrilla war, a low intensity conflict, and even a civil war.

Overview

The Troubles consisted of about thirty years of recurring acts of intense violence between elements of Northern Ireland's nationalist community (principally Roman Catholic) and unionist community (principally Protestant). The conflict was caused by the disputed status of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom and the domination of the minority nationalist community, and discrimination against them, by the unionist majority. The violence was characterised by the armed campaigns of paramilitary groups, including the Provisional IRA campaign of 1969–1997 which was aimed at the end of British rule in Northern Ireland and the creation of a new "all-Ireland", Irish Republic, and the Ulster Volunteer Force, formed in May 1966 in response to the perceived erosion of both the British character and unionist domination of Northern Ireland. The state security forces—the British Army and the police (the Royal Ulster Constabulary)—were also involved in the violence. The British government's point of view is that its forces were neutral in the conflict, trying to uphold law and order in Northern Ireland and the right of the people of Northern Ireland to democratic self-determination. Irish republicans, however, regarded the state forces as "combatants" in the conflict, noting collusion between the state forces and the loyalist paramilitaries as proof of this. The "Ballast" investigation by the Police Ombudsman has confirmed that British forces, and in particular the RUC, did collude with loyalist paramilitaries, were involved in murder, and did obstruct the course of justice when such claims had previously been investigated, although the extent to which such collusion occurred is still hotly disputed, with Unionists claiming that reports of collusion are either false or highly exaggerated and that there were also instances of collusion between the authorities in the Republic of Ireland and Republican paramilitaries. See also the section below on Collusion by Security Forces and loyalist paramilitaries.
   Alongside the violence, there was a political deadlock between the major political parties in Northern Ireland, including those who condemned violence, over the future status of Northern Ireland and the form of government there should be within Northern Ireland.
   The Troubles were brought to an uneasy end by a peace process which included the declaration of ceasefires by most paramilitary organisations and the complete decommissioning of their weapons, the reform of the police, and the corresponding withdrawal of army troops from the streets and from sensitive border areas such as South Armagh and Fermanagh, as agreed by the signatories to the Belfast Agreement (commonly known as the "Good Friday Agreement"). This reiterated the long-held British position, which had never before been fully acknowledged by successive Irish governments, that Northern Ireland will remain within the United Kingdom until a majority votes otherwise. On the other hand, the British Government recognised for the first time, as part of the prospective, the so-called "Irish dimension": the principle that the people of the island of Ireland as a whole have the right, without any outside interference, to solve the issues between North and South by mutual consent. The latter statement was key to winning support for the agreement from nationalists and republicans. It also established a devolved power-sharing government within Northern Ireland (which had been suspended from 14 October 2002 until 8 May 2007), where the government must consist of both unionist and nationalist parties.
   Though the number of active participants in the Troubles was relatively small, and the paramilitary organizations that claimed to represent the communities were sometimes unrepresentative of the general population, the Troubles touched the lives of most people in Northern Ireland on a daily basis, while occasionally spreading to Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland. At several times between 1969 and 1998 it seemed possible that the Troubles would escalate into a full-scale civil war—for example in 1972 after Bloody Sunday, or during the Hunger Strikes of 1980–1981, when there was mass, hostile mobilisation of the two communities. Many people today have had their political, social, and communal attitudes and perspectives shaped by the Troubles.

Background

Historic communal divisions 1609–1886

The origins of conflict between Catholics and Protestants in the north of Ireland lie in the British settler-colonial Plantation of Ulster in 1609, which confiscated native owned land and settled Ulster with (mainly Protestant) English and Scottish "planters". Conflict between the native Catholics and the "planters" led to two bloody ethno-religious conflicts between them in 1641–1653 and 1689–1691. The British Protestant political dominance in Ireland was ensured by victory in these wars and by the Penal Laws, which curtailed the religious, legal and political rights of anyone (including both Catholics and Dissenters, such as Presbyterians) who didn't conform to the state church—the Anglican Church of Ireland.
   The breakdown of the Penal Laws in the latter part of the eighteenth century heralded a renewed period of communal strife. In particular, the removal, in the 1780s, of restrictions on the ability of the Catholic Irish to rent land resulted in greater competition for it. With Roman Catholics now allowed to buy land and enter trades from which they'd formerly been banned, Protestant "Peep O'Day Boys" attacks on that community increased. In the 1790s Catholics in south Ulster organised as "The Defenders" and counter-attacked. This created polarisation between the communities and a dramatic reduction in reformers within the Protestant community, which had been increasingly receptive to ideas of democratic reform.
   Many Presbyterians, Catholics and liberal Anglicans were involved in the Society of the United Irishmen, a nationalist movement inspired by the French Revolution, aimed at ending sectarian division in Ireland, and to the establishment of an Irish Republic, non-sectarian and independent of Britain. However, the United Irishmen's ideal was destroyed both by the failure of the Irish Rebellion of 1798 and the accompanying repression, and by continuing sectarian violence between Catholics and Protestants. Moreover, the more hard-line Protestants were actively mobilised against the radicals by the Government. The Orange Order (founded in 1795) is a lasting manifestation of this movement. The effect was to separate Catholics and Protestants into permanently antagonistic camps.
   The abolition of the Irish Parliament and incorporation of Ireland into the United Kingdom in 1801 provided a new political framework within which this dichotomy between both communities continued. Moreover, Presbyterians largely abandoned their previous attachment to radical republican politics and adopted a common identity with Anglicans as part of a "loyal" Protestant community. Catholic Emancipation in 1829, through political agitation by Daniel O'Connell, largely eliminated legal discrimination against Catholics (around 75% of Ireland's population), Jews and other dissenters. However O'Connell's long-term goal (for which the Emancipation was essential) was the Repeal of the 1801 Union. He confidently, but incorrectly, declared on January 1 1843 that Repeal would come about that year. O'Connell's pacifist, majoritarian nationalism played an increasingly important role in Irish politics as the century went on by pressing for the restoration of the Irish Parliament (self-government known as "Home Rule"). Most Protestants, afraid of being a minority in a Catholic-dominated Ireland, tended to support continuing rule from Britain.
   The conflict was now represented as one between those who supported the Act of Union, the Unionists, and those who opposed it, the Nationalists, as it remains to the present day. By 1886 this transition to a modern representation of the conflict was completed when the two communities had organised into mutually opposing nationalist and unionist parties. Initially, many nationalists were prepared to accept maintaining some links with Britain, with the idea of complete independence only commanding the support of a radical minority; however, throughout the late 19th and early 20th century, support for such a compromise declined.
   By this time, Ulster Unionism had also acquired an economic motive, since Ulster was the most industrialised part of Ireland and the one most dependent on free trade with Britain and its empire. The immediate roots of the present conflict are to be found in the early 20th century disputes over Irish Home Rule and independence for Ireland.

The partition of Ireland 1912–1925

By the second decade of the 20th century, Home Rule, or limited Irish self-government, was on the brink of being conceded due to the agitation of the Irish Parliamentary Party who at times held the balance of power in the Westminster parliament. Unionists, mostly Protestant and concentrated in Ulster, resisted both self-government and independence for Ireland, fearing for their future in an overwhelmingly Catholic country dominated by the Roman Catholic Church. In 1912, unionists led by Edward Carson signed the Ulster Covenant and pledged to resist Home Rule by force if necessary. To this end, they formed the paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force and imported arms from Germany (the Easter Rising insurrectionists would do the same several years later).
   Nationalists formed the Irish Volunteers, whose ostensible goal was to oppose the Ulster Volunteers and ensure the enactment of the Third Home Rule Bill in the event of British or Unionist recalcitrance. The Irish Volunteers, however, were gradually infiltrated by members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), such as Patrick Pearse. The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 temporarily averted the crisis of possible civil war and delayed the resolution of the question of Irish independence. Home Rule, though actually passed in the British Parliament with Royal Assent, was suspended for the duration of the war. The Irish Volunteers split, the majority forming the National Volunteers and following John Redmond's call to support the Allied war effort and ensure the future implementation of home rule by voluntarily enlisting in Irish regiments of the 10th (Irish) Division or the 16th (Irish) Division of the New British Army. The men of the Ulster Volunteers joined the 36th (Ulster) Division. During 1914–1918 Irish regiments suffered severe losses.
   But the issue was inflamed by the staging of the nationalist Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916 by Irish Republican Brotherhood elements of the Irish Volunteers who didn't support the war effort. Although the rebellion was put down, the executions of fifteen of the Rising's leaders and the threat of conscription greatly radicalised Irish nationalists. The independence question came to a head in the 1918 December general election, when the separatist Sinn Féin party won a majority of seats in Ireland and set up the First Dáil (Irish Parliament) in Dublin, essentially seceding from the United Kingdom, although at the time this wasn't recognised by the UK or any other country except the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. At the same time, IRB volunteers, seeing themselves as the army of the Irish Republic, began armed attacks on state forces the following month (January 1919), killing two Catholic policemen who were transporting gelignite in Soloheadbeg, County Tipperary.
   In 1920, during a guerrilla war in Ireland which pitted the Volunteers or Irish Republican Army (IRA) against British state forces, the 1920 Government of Ireland Act partitioned the island of Ireland into two separate jurisdictions, Southern Ireland and Northern Ireland, both devolved regions of the United Kingdom. This partition of Ireland was confirmed when the Parliament of Northern Ireland exercised its right under the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 to opt out of the newly established Irish Free State in December 1922. The Irish Free State was an independent Dominion within the British Commonwealth. The Irish Free State was renamed Ireland in 1937 and it left the Commonwealth in 1949 when it declared that it was a republic.
   Northern Ireland remained a part of the United Kingdom, albeit under a separate system of government whereby it was given its own Parliament and devolved government. This system wasn't requested by unionists, but was included in the settlement by a government keen to rid the Westminster parliament of "the Irish question" that had dominated it for many years. Nonetheless, unionists immediately embraced the new regime and saw Northern Ireland as a state governed according to democratic principles, the rule of law, and in accordance with the will of a majority within its borders to remain part of the United Kingdom. Nationalists, however, saw the partition of Ireland as an illegal and arbitrary division of the island against the will of the vast majority of its people, and argued that the Northern Ireland state was neither legitimate nor democratic, but created with a deliberately gerrymandered Unionist majority.
   Nationalists within Northern Ireland, initially about 35% of its population, didn't accept the legitimacy of the new state. The roots of the Troubles lie in the failure of the Unionist state to integrate the Catholic/nationalist population in Northern Ireland, most of whom favoured a united Ireland, and the refusal of the same nationalists to eschew political irredentism.
   Northern Ireland came into being in a violent manner—a total of 557 people being killed in political or sectarian violence from 1920–1922, during and after the Irish War of Independence. Of these, 303 were Catholics (including IRA members), 172 were Protestants and 82 were Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) or British Army personnel. Belfast saw the majority of the violence, 452 people being killed there, of whom 267 were Catholics and 185 were Protestants (See also; Irish War of Independence in the North East.) Whereas elsewhere on the island this conflict was largely a confrontation between Irish Republican guerrillas and the British Police and Army, in the north it was marked by communal strife between Catholics and Protestants. The pattern of violence in the north was that loyalist groups, as well as an auxiliary police force, the B-Specials, responded to IRA attacks on the security forces with killings of Catholics. Nationalists characterise this violence, especially that in Belfast, as a "pogrom" against their community.
In 1920, for example, the IRA assassination of RIC district Inspector Swanzy in Lisburn outside a Protestant church following Sunday services resulted in the burning of large section of the Catholic quarter in the town. However, although a disproportionate number of the victims were Catholics (58% of victims from a community making up around 30% of the population in Belfast), both sides were guilty of atrocities. Nationalists in the rest of Ireland organised a boycott of northern goods in response to the attacks on Catholics, while some (including Michael Collins in the new Irish Free State) had plans for a military assault on Northern Ireland. This was interrupted by the Irish Civil War (1922–23) between Irish nationalist factions, and during this time the Northern state instead managed to consolidate its existence. Another legacy of the Irish Civil War, later to have a major impact on Northern Ireland, was the creation of a marginalised remnant of the Irish Republican Army, illegal in both Irish states and ideologically committed to overthrowing both of them by force of arms and re-establishing the Irish Republic of 1919–1921. In this context, the Northern Irish government passed the Special Powers Act in 1922; this gave sweeping powers to the government and police to do virtually anything seen as necessary to re-establish or preserve law and order. The Act continued to be used against the nationalist community long after the violence of this period had come to an end.
   In 1925 many nationalists expected partition to be abolished, or least to have large parts of Northern Ireland ceded to the Free State, by a Boundary Commission. The Commission instead recommended only minor changes in the border, effectively making partition of Ireland permanent. At this point, the Irish Free State formally recognised and accepted (albeit reluctantly) the border. In 1937, Eamon de Valera laid claim to the whole island of Ireland as territory of the Free State in Articles 2 and 3 of the Constitution of Ireland. However, the articles stipulated that "pending the re-integration of the national territory" the southern state's borders were the same as those established in 1922.

Northern Ireland 1925–1968

Each side established its own narratives to describe its perspective. Ulster Unionist Prime Minister of Northern Ireland James Craig talked of a "Protestant parliament and a Protestant State" in 1937, in response to his Southern counterpart Éamon de Valera's assertion in 1935 that Ireland was a "Catholic nation".
   From a Unionist perspective, Northern Ireland's nationalists were inherently disloyal and were determined to force them (Protestants and unionists) into a united Ireland. In the 1970s, during the period when the British government was unsuccessfully attempting to implement the Sunningdale Agreement, then-Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) councillor Hugh Logue described the agreement as the means by which unionists "will be trundled into a united Ireland". This threat was seen as justifying preferential treatment of unionists in housing, employment and other fields. The prevalence of large families and a more rapid population growth among Catholics was also seen as a threat.
   Former First Minister of Northern Ireland David Trimble admitted that Northern Ireland had been "a cold house for Catholics" during this period. Nonetheless, until the 1990s, unionist politicians were able to point to Northern Ireland's relative economic success compared with the Southern state (and the excessive influence of the Roman Catholic hierarchy over Government policy there) as a vindication of Northern Ireland's existence. From a nationalist perspective, continued discrimination against Catholics only proved that Northern Ireland was an inherently corrupt, British-imposed state. The controversial Republic of Ireland Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Charles Haughey, whose family had fled County Londonderry during the 1920s Troubles, described Northern Ireland as "a failed political entity". The unionist government ignored Edward Carson's warning in 1921 that alienating Catholics would make Northern Ireland inherently unstable.
   After the initial Troubles of the early 1920s, there were occasional incidents of sectarian unrest in Northern Ireland, a brief and ineffective IRA campaign in the 1940s, and another abortive IRA campaign in the 1950s, but by the early 1960s Northern Ireland was fairly stable.

Beginning of the Troubles

The question of when The Troubles began remains a matter of some dispute, linked to some extent to the issue of blame.
   The UVF was formed in May 1966. as a loyalist paramilitary group and named after the Ulster Volunteers of 1912. The UVF claimed what many acknowledge as the first victim of the Troubles, when they shot dead 28-year-old storeman John Patrick Scullion in west Belfast. Barman Peter Ward, an 18-year-old from west Belfast, became the second victim of a UVF gun attack. Victor Arbuckle, aged 29, was shot dead by Loyalists during street disturbances on the Shankill Road in Belfast in October 1969, the first RUC officer to die in the troubles. The UVF was also responsible for a series of attacks on power stations and reservoirs in Northern Ireland during 1969. It was hoped that this campaign would be blamed on the IRA, forcing moderate unionists to increase their opposition to the tentative reforms of Terence O'Neill's government.
   Others prefer to date the start of The Troubles to 1968, when widespread rioting and public disorder broke out at the marches of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA). This group launched a peaceful civil rights campaign in 1967,. which borrowed the language and symbolism of the Civil Rights Movement of Dr. Martin Luther King in the United States. NICRA was seeking a redress of Catholic and nationalist grievances within Northern Ireland. Specifically, they wanted an end to the gerrymandering of electoral constituencies that produced unrepresentative local councils (particularly in Derry City) by putting virtually all Catholics in a limited number of electoral wards; the abolition of the rate-payer franchise in local government elections, which gave Protestants (who tended to be richer) disproportionate voting power; an end to unfair allocation of jobs and housing; and an end to the Special Powers Act (which allowed for internment and other repressive measures) which was seen as being aimed at the nationalist community.
   Initially, Terence O'Neill, the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, reacted favourably to this moderate-seeming campaign and promised reforms of Northern Ireland. However, he was opposed by many hard-line unionists, including William Craig and Ian Paisley, who accused him of being a "sell-out". Some Unionists immediately mistrusted the NICRA, seeing it as an IRA "Trojan Horse". Many resented the concept of Catholic equality in this "Protestant state". Violence broke out at several Civil Rights marches when Protestant loyalists attacked civil rights demonstrators with clubs. The Royal Ulster Constabulary, almost entirely Protestant, was widely accused of supporting the loyalists and of allowing the violence to occur.
Much of the hostile loyalist reaction to the Civil Rights Movement was linked to the ability of leaders to provoke fear within the Unionist populace that the IRA wasn't only behind the NICRA, but was also planning a renewed armed campaign. In fact, the IRA was moribund, had few weapons, fewer members, negligible support, and was increasingly committed (out of necessity) to non-violent politics. The first bombing campaign of the Troubles (largely directed against power stations and other infrastructure) was staged by the Loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force in 1969 to try to implicate the IRA.
   Communal disturbances worsened throughout 1969, escalating in January after a march by the People's Democracy from Belfast to Derry was attacked by loyalists in Burntollet, County Londonderry. The RUC were accused of failing to protect the marchers. Barricades were erected in nationalist areas of Derry and Belfast in the following months. This disorder culminated in the Battle of the Bogside (August 12 1969–August 14 1969), a huge communal uprising in Derry between police and nationalists. The riot started in a confrontation between Catholic residents of the Bogside, police, and members of the Apprentice Boys of Derry who were due to march past the Bogside along the city walls.
   Rioting between police and loyalists on one side and Bogside residents on the other continued for two days before British troops were sent in to restore order. The "Battle" sparked vicious sectarian rioting in Belfast, Newry, Strabane and elsewhere, starting on August 14 1969, which left many people dead and many homes burned. The riots began with nationalist demonstrations in support of the Bogside residents and escalated when a grenade was thrown at a police station. The RUC in response deployed three Shorland armoured cars mounted with Browning heavy machine guns, and killed a nine year old boy, struck by a tracer bullet fired by a Browning machine gun as he lay in bed in his family's flat in Divis Tower in the nationalist Divis Street area of Belfast. Loyalist crowds attacked Catholic areas, burning down much of Bombay Street, Madrid Street and other Catholic streets (see Northern Ireland riots of August 1969).
   Nationalists alleged that the Royal Ulster Constabulary had aided, or at least not acted against, loyalists in these riots. The IRA had been widely criticised by its supporters for failing to defend the Catholic community during the Belfast troubles of August 1969, when seven people had been killed, about 750 injured and 1,505 Catholic families had been forced out of their homes—almost five times the number of dispossessed Protestant households. One Catholic priest reported that his parishioners were contemptuously calling the IRA "I Ran Away".
   The government of Northern Ireland requested that the British Government deploy the British Army in Northern Ireland to restore order, . possibly in response to media reports that the Irish government were considering military intervention to protect Catholic areas in Derry . Nationalists initially welcomed the Army, often giving the soldiers tea and sandwiches, as they didn't trust the police to act in an unbiased manner, but relations soured due to heavy-handednessby the Army, who were soon considered to be biased in favour of the Unionists.
   Many unionists see the civil rights movement as the cause of the Troubles. They argue that it led to a destabilisation of government and created a void filled later by paramilitary groups. Others, mainly (though not exclusively) nationalist, argue that the civil rights campaign and the opposition to it by Ian Paisley and other loyalists was merely a symptom of a sectarian system of government that was itself inherently corrupt and prone to collapse.

The peak of violence and the collapse of Stormont

The years 1970–1972 saw an explosion of political violence in Northern Ireland, peaking in 1972, when nearly 500 people lost their lives. There are several reasons why violence escalated in these years.
   Unionists claim the main reason was the formation of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (Provisional IRA), a group formed when the IRA split into the Provisional and Official factions. While the older IRA had embraced non-violent civil agitation, the new Provisional IRA was determined to wage "armed struggle" against British rule in Northern Ireland. The new IRA was willing to take on a sectarian character as "defenders of the Catholic community", rather than seeking working-class unity across both communities which had become the aim of the "Officials". Unionists perceive this ongoing campaign as the main cause and sustaining element of the Troubles.
Nationalists argued that the upsurge in violence was caused by the disappointment of the hopes engendered by the civil rights movement and the repression subsequently directed at their community. They point to a number of events in these years to support this opinion. One such incident was the Falls Curfew in July 1970, when 3,000 troops imposed a curfew on the nationalist Lower Falls area of Belfast, firing more than 1,500 rounds of ammunition in gun battles with the IRA and killing four people. Another was the 1971 introduction of internment without trial—out of over 350 initial detainees, not a single one was a Protestant. Moreover, due to poor intelligence, very few of those interned were actually republican activists, but some went on to become republicans as a result of their unfortunate experiences. Between 1971 and 1975, 1,981 people were detained; 1,874 were Catholic/republican, while 107 were Protestant/loyalist. There were widespread allegations from the nationalist community of abuse and even torture of detainees. Most emotionally of all, nationalists also point to the fatal shootings of 14 unarmed nationalist civil rights demonstrators by the British Army in Derry in January 1972 on what became known as Bloody Sunday.
   The Provisional IRA (or "Provos", as they became known), formed in early 1970, soon established itself as more aggressive and militant in its response to attacks on the nationalist community by loyalists and the police, gaining much support in the nationalist ghettos in the early 1970s as "defenders" of those communities. Despite the increasingly reformist and Marxist politics of the Official IRA, they nonetheless began their own armed campaign in reaction to the ongoing violence and the deteriorating relationship between the Catholic community and the British military. From 1970 onwards, both the PIRA and OIRA engaged in armed confrontations with the British Army.
1970 saw the first females killed by the troubles when two young girls, aged 4 and 9 were killed when a bomb being made by their father exploded in their own home. The bomb also killed two IRA members. In the same year IRA snipers killed 5 Protestants and IRA member Michael Kane was killed by his own bomb whilst attempting to plant it at an electricity transformer. The IRA also started to flex its muscles in trying to "police" Roman Catholic areas when they killed two men who were alleged to have been involved in "criminality".
   By 1972, the Provisionals' campaign was of such intensity that they'd already killed more than 100 soldiers, wounded 500 more and carried out 1,300 bombings, mostly against commercial targets that they considered "the artificial economy". The bombing campaign killed many civilians, notably on Bloody Friday in July 1972, when 22 bombs were set off in the centre of Belfast. The Official IRA, who had never been fully committed to armed action, called off their campaign in June 1972. The Provisionals, however, despite a temporary ceasefire in 1972 and talks with British officials, were determined to continue their campaign until the achievement of a united Ireland.
   The loyalist paramilitaries, including the Ulster Volunteer Force and the newly-founded Ulster Defence Association, responded to the increasing violence with a campaign of sectarian assassination of nationalists, whom they identified simply as Catholics. Some of these murders were particularly gruesome, as in the case of the Shankill Butchers, who beat and tortured their victims before killing them. Another feature of the political violence was the involuntary or forced displacement of both Catholics and Protestants from formerly mixed residential areas. For example, in Belfast, Protestants were forced out of Lenadoon, and Catholics were driven out of the Rathcoole estate and the Westvale neighbourhood. In Derry City almost all the Protestants fled to the predominantly loyalist Fountain Estate and Waterside areas.
The UK government in London, perceiving that the Northern Ireland administration was incapable of containing the security situation, suspended the unionist-controlled Stormont Home Rule government in 1972 and introduced "Direct Rule" from London. Their government addressed many of the concerns of the civil rights movement: re-drawing electoral boundaries to make them more representative, giving all citizens the vote in local elections, and transferring the power to allocate public housing to an independent Northern Ireland Housing Executive, for example. Direct Rule was initially intended as a short-term measure, the medium-term strategy being to restore self-government to Northern Ireland on a basis that was acceptable to both unionists and nationalists. Agreement proved elusive, however, and the Troubles continued throughout the 1970s and 1980s within a context of political deadlock.

The Sunningdale Agreement

In June 1973, following the publication of a British White Paper and an abortive referendum in March on the status of Northern Ireland, a new parliamentary body, the Northern Ireland Assembly, was established. Elections to this were held on 28 June. In October of that year mainstream nationalist and unionist parties, along with the British and (Southern) Irish governments, negotiated the Sunningdale Agreement, which was intended to produce a political settlement within Northern Ireland, but with a so-called "Irish dimension" involving the Republic of Ireland. The agreement provided for "power-sharing" between nationalists and unionists and a "Council of Ireland" designed to encourage cross-border co-operation. Seamus Mallon, the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) politician, has pointed to the marked similarities between the Sunningdale Agreement and the Belfast Agreement of 1998. Famously, he characterised the latter as "Sunningdale for slow learners".
   Unionism, however, was split over Sunningdale, which was also opposed by the IRA, whose goal remained nothing short of an end to Northern Ireland's existence as part of the United Kingdom. Many unionists opposed the concept of power-sharing, arguing that it wasn't feasible to share power with those (nationalists) who sought the destruction of the state. Perhaps more significant, however, was the unionist opposition to the "Irish dimension" and the Council of Ireland, which was perceived as being an all-Ireland parliament-in-waiting. The remarks by SDLP councillor Hugh Logue to an audience at Trinity College Dublin that Sunningdale was the tool "by which the Unionists will be trundled off to a united Ireland" ensured its defeat.
   In January 1974, Brian Faulkner was narrowly deposed as Unionist Party leader by his own party and replaced by Harry West. A UK general election in February 1974 gave the anti-Sunningdale unionists the opportunity to test unionist opinion with the slogan "Dublin is only a Sunningdale away", and the result galvanised their opposition: they won 11 of the 12 seats, winning 58% of the vote with most of the rest going to nationalists and pro-Sunningdale unionists.
   Ultimately, however, the Sunningdale Agreement was brought down by mass action on the part of loyalists (primarily the Ulster Defence Association, at that time over 20,000 strong) and Protestant workers, who formed the Ulster Workers' Council. They organised a general strike—the Ulster Workers' Council Strike. This stopped all business in Northern Ireland and cut off essential services such as water and electricity. Nationalists argue that the UK government didn't do enough to break this strike and uphold the Sunningdale initiative. In the event, however, faced with such determined opposition, the pro-Sunningdale unionists resigned from the power-sharing government and the new regime collapsed.
   The failure of Sunningdale led on to the examination in London of the option of a rapid British withdrawal by the new government of Harold Wilson. This was also considered in Dublin by Garret FitzGerald in a memorandum of June 1975, on which he commented in 2006. This concluded that the Irish government could do little on such a withdrawal with its army of 12,500 men, with the likely result of a greater loss of life.
   The violence continued through the rest of the 1970s. The Provisional IRA declared a ceasefire in 1975 but returned to violence in 1976. By this time they'd lost the hope that they'd had in the early 1970s that they could force a rapid British withdrawal from Northern Ireland, and instead developed a strategy known as the "Long War", which involved a less intense but more sustained campaign of violence that could continue indefinitely. The Official IRA ceasefire of 1972, however, became permanent, and the "Official" movement eventually evolved into the Workers Party, which rejected violence completely. However, a splinter from the "Officials" in 1974—the Irish National Liberation Army—continued with a campaign of violence.
   By the late 1970s, war weariness was visible in both communities. One manifestation of this was the formation of group known as "Peace People", which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1976. The Peace People organised large demonstrations calling for an end to paramilitary violence. However, their campaign lost momentum after they appealed to the nationalist community to provide information on the IRA to security forces. The Army and police were so unpopular in many nationalist areas that this wasn't seen as an objective stance.

The Hunger Strikes and the emergence of Sinn Féin

Successive British Governments, having failed to achieve a political settlement, tried to "normalise" Northern Ireland. Aspects included the removal of internment without trial and the removal of political status for paramilitary prisoners. From 1976 onwards, paramilitaries were tried in juryless Diplock courts to avoid intimidation of jurors. On conviction, they were to be treated as ordinary criminals. Resistance to this policy among republican prisoners led to over 500 of them in the Maze prison initiating the blanket protest and the dirty protest. Their protests culminated in hunger strikes in 1980 and 1981, aimed at the restoration of political status.
   In the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike, ten republican prisoners (seven from the Provisional IRA and three from the Irish National Liberation Army) starved themselves to death. The first hunger striker to die, Bobby Sands, was elected to Parliament on an Anti-H-Block ticket, as was his election agent Owen Carron following Sands' death. The hunger strikes proved emotive events for the nationalist community—over 100,000 people attended Sands' funeral mass at St. Luke's, Twinbrook, West Belfast, and crowds also attended the subsequent funerals.
   From an Irish republican perspective, the significance of these events was to demonstrate a potential for political and electoral strategy. In the wake of the hunger strikes, Sinn Féin, the Provisional IRA's political wing, began to contest elections for the first time in both Northern Ireland and the Republic. In 1986, Sinn Féin recognised the legitimacy of the Irish Dáil, which caused a small group of republicans to break away and form Republican Sinn Féin.
   From a unionist perspective, the hunger strikes appeared to show that the nationalist community supported terrorism and this perception deepened sectarian antagonism.

The "Long War"

Paramilitary campaigns continued on both sides until the respective republican and loyalists ceasefires of 1994 ("non-authorised" killings such as vendettas or drugs-related killings still continue today). Fewer people were killed in the 1980s and 1990s than in the 1970s, but the duration and seemingly interminable nature of the political violence has left behind a very negative sociological legacy.
The PIRA's "Long War" was boosted by large donations of arms to them from Libya in 1986 (see Provisional IRA arms importation) due to Moammar Qaddafi's anger at Thatcher's government for assisting the Reagan government's bombing of Tripoli, which killed one of Qaddafi's children.
In the mid to late 1980s loyalist paramilitaries, including the Ulster Volunteer Force, the Ulster Defence Association and Ulster Resistance, imported arms and explosives from South Africa. The weapons obtained were divided between the UDA, the UVF and Ulster Resistance, and led to an escalation in the assassination of Catholics, although some of the weaponry (such as rocket propelled grenades) were hardly used. These killings were in response to the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement which gave the Irish government a "consultative role" in the internal government of Northern Ireland.

Collusion by security forces and loyalist paramilitaries

One particularly controversial aspect of the conflict has been allegations of collusion between the state security forces and loyalist paramilitaries, traditionally from Irish nationalist or pro-Irish republican media and news outlets, both print and online, such as the Irish News, An Phoblacht, the Irish People (USA), Slugger O'Toole, the Pat Finucane Center, et al, but also The Guardian and, more recently, the BBC.

The UDR and loyalists

One problem, highlighted by documents declassified in 2004, is that British government documents from the early 1970s show overlapping membership between British Army units like the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) and loyalist paramilitary groups. The documents include a report titled "Subversion in the UDR" which details the problem. The documents state that:

an estimated 5–15% of UDR soldiers were directly linked to loyalist paramilitary groups.
it was believed that the "best single source of weapons, and the only significant source of modern weapons, for Protestant extremist groups was the UDR."
it was feared that UDR troops were loyal to "Ulster" alone rather than to "Her Majesty's Government".
The British Government knew that UDR weapons were being used by loyalist paramilitaries, including the killing of a Roman Catholic civilian and other attacks

Despite knowing that the UDR had problems and that over 200 weapons had been passed from British Army hands to loyalist paramilitaries by 1973, the British Government went on to increase the role of the UDR in maintaining order in Northern Ireland. The Special Patrol Group was stood down after the men's conviction. The nationalist Pat Finucane Centre has claimed that the group of British Army, RUC, UDR and UVF members that Wier and McCaughey referred to, which they called the "Glenane gang", was responsible for 87 killings in the 1970s, including the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 1974 and the Miami Showband killings of 1975.

Collusion in the 1980s and 1990s

Elements within the Army and police have been shown to have leaked intelligence to loyalists from the late 1980s to target republican activists. In 1992, a British agent within the UDA, Brian Nelson, revealed Army complicity in his activities which included murder and importing arms. Factions within the British Army and RUC are known to have cooperated with Nelson and the UDA through the British Army Intelligence group called the Force Research Unit. Since the late 1990s, some loyalists have confirmed to journalists such as Peter Taylor that they received files and intelligence from security sources on Republican targets.
In a report released on 22 January 2007, the Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan stated that UVF informers committed serious crimes, including murder, with the full knowledge of their handlers. The report alleged that certain Special Branch officers created false statements, blocked evidence searches and "baby-sat" suspects during interviews. Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) councillor and former Police Federation chairman Jimmy Spratt said if the report "had had one shred of credible evidence then we could have expected charges against former Police Officers. There are no charges, so the public should draw their own conclusion, the report is clearly based on little fact". However, the then Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Hain, said that he was "convinced that at least one prosecution will arise out of today's report". Peter Hain also said, "There are all sorts of opportunities for prosecutions to follow. The fact that some retired police officers obstructed the investigation and refused to co-operate with the Police Ombudsman is very serious in itself. There will be consequences for those involved and it's a matter for the relevant bodies to take up".

Shoot-to-kill allegations

In addition, republicans allege that the security forces operated a policy of "shoot-to-kill"—killing rather than arresting IRA suspects. The security forces denied this and point out that in incidents such as the killing of eight IRA men at Loughgall in 1987, the paramilitaries who were killed were heavily armed. Others argue that incidents such as the shooting of three unarmed IRA members in Gibraltar by the SAS ten months later confirmed suspicions among republicans, and in the British and Irish media, of a tacit British "shoot-to-kill" policy of suspected IRA members.

The paramilitary ceasefires and peace process

The paramilitaries' activities

Since the late 1980s, while the IRA continued its armed campaign, its political wing Sinn Féin, led since 1983 by Gerry Adams, sought a negotiated end to the conflict, although Adams knew that this would be a very long process. In the 1970s he himself predicted that the war would last another 20 years. This was manifested in open talks with John Hume—the Social Democratic and Labour Party leader—and secret talks with Government officials. Loyalists were also engaged in behind-the-scenes talks to end the violence, liaising with the British and Irish governments through Protestant clergy, in particular the Presbyterian Rev. Roy Magee and the Anglican Archbishop Robin Eames. After a prolonged period of political manoeuvring in the background, the loyalist and republican paramilitaries declared ceasefires in 1994.
   The year leading up to the ceasefires was a particularly tense one, marked by atrocities. The UDA and UVF stepped up their killings of Catholics (for the first time killing more civilians than Republicans in a year in 1993). The IRA responded with the Shankill Road bombing in October 1993, which aimed to kill the UDA leadership, but in fact killed nine Protestant civilians. The UDA in turn retaliated with the Greysteel massacre and shootings at Castlerock, County Londonderry.
   On June 16 1994, just before the ceasefires, the Irish National Liberation Army killed three UVF members in a gun attack on the Shankill Road. In revenge, three days later, the UVF killed six civilians in a shooting at a pub in Loughinisland, County Down. The IRA, in the remaining month before its ceasefire, killed four senior loyalists, three from the UDA and one from the UVF. There are various interpretations of the spike in violence before the ceasefires. One theory is that the loyalists feared the peace process represented an imminent "sellout" of the Union and ratcheted up their violence accordingly. Another explanation is that the republicans were "settling old scores" before the end of their campaigns and wanted to enter the political process from a position of military strength rather than weakness.
   Eventually, in August 1994, the Provisional IRA declared a ceasefire. The loyalist paramilitaries, temporarily united in the "Combined Loyalist Military Command", reciprocated six weeks later. Although these ceasefires failed in the short run, they mark an effective end to large-scale political violence in the Troubles, as they paved the way for the final ceasefire.

The second ceasefire

On 9 February 1996, less than two years after the declaration of the ceasefire, the IRA revoked it with the Docklands bombing in the Canary Wharf area of London, killing two people and causing £85 million in damage to the city's financial centre. Sinn Féin blamed the failure of the ceasefire on the UK government's refusal to begin all-party negotiations until the IRA decommissioned its weapons.
   The attack was followed by several more, most notably the Manchester Bombing which destroyed a large area of the centre of the city on 15 June 1996. It was the largest bomb attack in Great Britain since World War II, and while the attack avoided many fatalities due to the rapid response of the emergency services to an earlier telephone warning made to a local television station, over 200 people were injured in the attack, many of them outside the established cordon. The damage caused by the blast was valued at £411 million. The last British soldier to die in the Troubles, Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick, was also killed during this period, on 12 February 1997, by the "South Armagh sniper".
   The IRA reinstated their ceasefire in July 1997 as negotiations for the document that would become known as the Good Friday Agreement were starting without Sinn Féin. In September of the same year Sinn Féin signed The Mitchell Principles and was invited into the talks.
   The UVF was the first paramilitary grouping to split as a result of their ceasefire, spawning the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) in 1996. In December 1997, the INLA assassinated LVF leader Billy Wright, leading to a series of revenge killings of Catholics by loyalist groups. In addition, two hardline splinter groups from the Provisional IRA, the Real IRA and the Continuity IRA, who rejected the Provisionals' ceasefire, continued a bombing campaign.
   In August 1998, a Real IRA bomb in Omagh killed 29 civilians. This bombing, the single worst of the entire Troubles, largely discredited "dissident" Republicans and their campaigns in the eyes of most nationalists. They are now small and non-influential groups. The INLA also declared a ceasefire after the Belfast Agreement was passed in 1998.
   Since then, most paramilitary violence has been directed inwards, at their "own" communities and at other factions within their organisations. The UDA, for example, has come to blows with their fellow loyalists the UVF on two occasions since 2000, and has also been torn apart repeatedly by internal feuding between "Brigade commanders" over power within the organisation and the proceeds of organised crime.
On the Republican side, the tendency for internecine violence has been less marked, but the Provisional IRA has been accused of killing at least one double-agent (Denis Donaldson) and its members have also been accused of intimidating and expelling Catholics, assaulting men and women, and, in the most extreme cases, killing young men such as Robert McCartney, Matthew Ignatius Burns and Andrew Kearney.

The political process

After the ceasefires, talks began between the main political parties in Northern Ireland with the aim of establishing political agreement. These talks eventually produced the Belfast Agreement of 1998. This Agreement restored self-government to Northern Ireland on the basis of "power-sharing", and an executive was formed in 1999 consisting of the four main parties, including Sinn Féin. Other reforms included reform of the RUC, which was renamed as the Police Service of Northern Ireland and required to recruit a minimum quota of Catholics.
   However, the power-sharing Executive and Assembly were suspended in 2002, when unionists withdrew following the exposure of a Provisional IRA spy ring within the Sinn Féin office (which was later revealed to have been started by undercover British agent Denis Donaldson). This was on top of ongoing tensions between unionists and Sinn Féin about the Provisional IRA's failure to disarm fully and sufficiently quickly. PIRA decommissioning has since been completed (in September 2005) to the satisfaction of most, but the Democratic Unionist Party continued to be wary over republican claims that the "war was over". A feature of Northern Irish politics since the Agreement has been the eclipse in electoral terms of the relatively moderate parties such as the Social Democratic and Labour Party and Ulster Unionist Party by more extreme parties—Sinn Féin and the DUP.
   Similarly, although political violence is greatly reduced, sectarian animosity hasn't disappeared and residential areas are more segregated between Catholic nationalists and Protestant unionists than ever. Because of this, progress towards restoring the power-sharing institutions has been slow and tortuous. Though the "peace process" is slow-going, movements have formed which give those affected by The Troubles a voice in their communities. In particular, the Corrymeela Community in Ballycastle teaches the prejudice-reduction model, which has been adopted by the Ulster Project International to improve relations between Protestant and Catholic families across the country.
   Recently, Gerry Adams and Ian Paisley have announced the formation of a power-sharing government, ending the 5 year stand-off.

The parades issue

Inter-communal tensions rise and violence often breaks out during the "marching season" when the Protestant Orange Order parades take place across Northern Ireland. The parades are held to commemorate William of Orange's victory in the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, which secured the Protestant Ascendancy and British rule in Ireland. One particular flashpoint that has caused repeated strife is the Garvaghy Road area in Portadown, where an Orange parade from Drumcree Church passes by a predominantly nationalist estate off the Garvaghy Road. This parade has now been banned indefinitely, following nationalist riots against the parade, and also loyalist counter-riots against its banning. In 1995, 1996 and 1997, there were several weeks of prolonged rioting throughout Northern Ireland over the impasse at Drumcree. A number of people died in this violence, including a Catholic taxi driver, killed by the Loyalist Volunteer Force, and three (of four) nominally Catholic brothers (from a mixed-religion family) died when their house in Ballymoney was petrol-bombed.
Disputes have also occurred in Belfast over parade routes along the Ormeau and Crumlin Roads. Orangemen hold that to march their "traditional route" is their civil right. Nationalists argue that by parading through predominantly Catholic areas, the Orange Order is being unnecessarily provocative. Symbolically, the ability to either parade or to block a parade is viewed as expressing ownership of "territory" and influence over the government of Northern Ireland.
Many commentators have expressed the view that the violence over the parades issue has provided an outlet for the violence of paramilitary groups who are otherwise on ceasefire.

Casualties: brief summary

Responsibility

Between 1969 and 2001, 3,523 people were killed as a result of the Troubles.
Approximately 60% of the victims were killed by republicans, 30% by loyalists and 10% by the British, Irish and Northern Irish security forces.

Responsibility for killing (External Link)
Responsible party	No.
Republican Paramilitary Groups	2055
Loyalist Paramilitary Groups	1020
Security Forces	368
Persons unknown	80
Total	3523

Status

Most of those killed were civilians or members of the security forces, with smaller groups of victims identified with republican and loyalist paramilitary groups. It is often disputed whether some civilians were members of paramilitary organisations due to their secretive nature. Several PIRA paramilitaries were claimed to be civilians by CAIN but are now claimed by the IRA as their members, Padraig O'Seanachain (Patrick Shanaghan) for example. At least three Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) members killed were also Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) soldiers. At least one civilian victim was an off-duty member of the TA.

Deaths by status of victim (External Link)
Status	No.
Civilian	1855
Members of security forces (and reserves)	1123
of whom:
British Army (excluding Northern Ireland regiments)	499
Royal Ulster Constabulary	301
Ulster Defence Regiment	197
Northern Ireland Prison Service	24
Garda Síochána (Republic of Ireland police)	9
Royal Irish Regiment	7
Territorial Army	7
English police forces	6
Royal Air Force	4
Royal Navy	2
Irish Army	1
Members of Republican Paramilitary Groups	394
Members of Loyalist Paramilitary Groups	151

Location

Most killings took place within Northern Ireland, especially Belfast, although surrounding counties, as well as Dublin and large English cities (such as London and Birmingham) were affected, albeit to a lesser degree than in Northern Ireland itself. Occasionally, violence also took place in western Europe, especially against the British Army in Germany.

Geographic distribution of deaths in Northern Ireland conflict(External Link)
Location	No.
County Antrim	207
County Armagh	276
East Belfast	128
North Belfast	576
County Tyrone	339
West Belfast	623
County Down	243
County Fermanagh	112
Derry City	227
County Londonderry	123
Republic of Ireland	113
England	125
Continental Europe	18

Chronological listing

Deaths related to Northern Ireland conflict (1969–2006).Number of deaths listed as "conflict-related (uncertain if conflict-related)" ((External Link)).
Year	No.
2006	3 (5)
2005	5 (7)
2004	2 (3)
2003	10 (3)
2002	11 (5)
2001	16
2000	19
1999	8
1998	55
1997	21
1996	18
1995	9
1994	64
1993	88
1992	89
1991	96
1990	81
1989	75
1988	104
1987	98
1986	61
1985	57
1984	69
1983	85
1982	110
1981	113
1980	80
1979	121
1978	81
1977	111
1976	295
1975	260
1974	294
1973	253
1972	479
1971	171
1970	28
1969	16

Additional statistics

Additional estimated statistics on the conflict
Incident	No.
Injury	47,000
Shooting	37,000
Armed robbery	22,500
Persons imprisoned for paramilitary offences	19,600
Bombing and attempted bombing	16,200
Arson	2,200

Analytical perspectives

Denomination, class and region

Denomination and class are the two major determinants of political allegiance in Northern Ireland. Almost all Protestants are Unionists, and the overwhelming majority of Catholics are nationalists; many republicans. Working class Catholics and Protestants are more likely to support paramilitary groups and radical political parties on either side. Moreover, the paramilitaries have their strongholds in urban working-class areas and it's this social class which is the most segregated along sectarian lines.
   The radical political parties associated with paramilitaries have sometimes offered far more radical political analyses than the more middle-class and conservative parties. Sinn Féin, from the late 1970s, adopted a radical "anti-imperialist" perspective of the political situation, comparing it to "liberation struggles" elsewhere such as in the Palestinian Territories and South Africa. Their analysis also defined the conflict partly in terms of "class struggle", although unlike the Marxist Official IRA, they didn't take this to mean that the loyalist working class were potential allies. Loyalists in the 1970s even advocated majoritarian forms of an "independent Ulster". There is little support for this idea today. In the 1980s, some loyalists, notably John McMichael of the UDA (who was assassinated by the PIRA), advocated a power-sharing, egalitarian solution to the conflict, which they released in a pamphlet titled, "Common Sense".
   It has been suggested by many loyalists that mainstream Unionists resisted reform and used the IRA scare tactic in part to maintain their political and economic power at the expense of both Nationalists as well as the impoverished Unionist/Loyalist communities. Parties such as the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) maintained their dominance in part by using the "union" and IRA issues as a means to maintain voting unity from the working-class Unionists who, politically, gained little from the UUP's policies. It is argued, for example by the Progressive Unionist Party that one reason Loyalist paramilitary groups formed in such great numbers is the true disenfranchisement of the poorer Protestant segments of Northern Irish society.
   Religious commitment is sometimes, but not normally, an indicator of extreme political views. For example, Ian Paisley and his supporters combine strict Presbyterianism with hardline unionist politics. Of the paramilitaries, Catholic piety is generally not combined with militant republicanism, and loyalist paramilitaries are rarely overtly religious. However, there have been prominent republican paramilitaries who have also publicly displayed their religious faith (such as Gerry McGeough, Sean Mac Stiofain, Anthony Mangan, and Billy McKee). Assassinated loyalist leader Billy Wright also prominently displayed his faith, but theology and religion (as opposed to communal identification based on religion) are not prominent in republican and loyalist ideologies.
   Region also plays a role in determining the politics of people in Northern Ireland. Some areas, notably West Belfast, South Armagh, southern County Londonderry and much of County Tyrone, are noted for their hardline Irish republican politics. Other Catholic-dominated areas such as Derry City have a relatively moderate political tradition with a high level of support for the non-violent SDLP. Similarly, certain regions, notably East Belfast, the Portadown area and northern County Antrim are known for their staunchly pro-loyalist politics.

Policing

Since the existence of Northern Ireland has been disputed by some since its inception, its means of coercion, its police force, has necessarily also been an area of dispute. Specifically, the issues surrounding policing in Northern Ireland concern the composition of the police force—for example, whether it's representative of the population, its political orientation—whether it favours unionists over nationalists, and its role—whether it's primarily a service to uphold the rule of law, or it's a force with the goal of defending the Northern Ireland state.
The Royal Ulster Constabulary, the police force in Northern Ireland, was since its inception, largely, though not totally, Protestant for a number of reasons. Catholics didn't join in the numbers expected by the British when the force was first created. Some of those who did reported an unwelcoming working environment . Those Catholics who did join were also often targeted for assassination by republican paramilitaries, yet a number of Catholics did join the RUC. One (James Flanagan) served as Chief Constable, and was later knighted, while the current leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, Mark Durkan, is the son of a Catholic RUC officer. Musicians Phil Coulter and Marilla Ness’ fathers were also policemen.
   The result was that critics of the unionist and loyalist communities portrayed the police force as a "unionist police force". Sinn Féin produced posters in the 1990s which said of the RUC, "90% Protestant, 100% unionist" and depicted an officer wearing an Orange sash.
   Even more than the regular police force, this perception was widely held by nationalists about the B-Specials, a part time police force mobilised in times of emergency. The B-Specials were disbanded in 1970, but were replaced by the Ulster Defence Regiment—a locally recruited part-time unit of the British Army—intended for security duties in Northern Ireland. While the UDR killed only 8 people during the Troubles and often carried out security duties professionally and well, some of its members were found to have been involved with loyalist paramilitary groups and in a number of killings of Catholics. Although this regiment initially had approximately 18% of its membership from the Catholic community, intimidation from Loyalists (within) and the IRA (without) caused the vast majority of Catholic members to leave. The Catholic community was left with a view of the UDR as a partisan force - no different to many than the USC. The UDR were amalgamated with the Royal Irish Rangers to form the Royal Irish Regiment in 1992 which had one regular battalion, one TA battalion and seven Home Service (former UDR) battalions.
   One of the major social problems created by the Troubles was the takeover of law enforcement in certain areas by either republican or loyalists paramilitaries, who punished local criminals with beatings, kneecappings and even murder. One of the principal aims of the peace process was to establish an accountable police force that could be trusted to act as the sole enforcers of law and order.
   Sinn Féin entered the negotiations, that led to the Belfast Agreement in 1998, with a demand that the RUC be disbanded. A policing review, as part of the Agreement, resulted in some reforms of policing, including more rigorous accountability, measures to increase the number of Catholic officers and the renaming of the RUC to the Police Service of Northern Ireland or PSNI. Sinn Féin continued to withhold support from the new police service until a Special Árd Fheis meeting in January 2007, at which it voted to recognise the PSNI and, for the first time, to call on republicans to cooperate with the police and for their supporters to join the service. Unionists and some nationalists had voiced fears that Sinn Féin actually wished to place former republican paramilitaries/operatives into the new PSNI.
   In January 2007, a report by Police Ombudsman, Nuala O'Loan, found that Police Special Branch officers had co-operated with the UVF in a large number of murders in Belfast in the 1990s. (see collusion section)