Irish Govt withdraws file alleging Gerry Kelly had IRA leadership role from National Archives

Mark Hennessy, Ireland and Britain Editor with The Irish Times, January 10th. 2025

The Government has removed a key file from the National Archives, including a letter from a future Garda commissioner alleging that Sinn Féin’s Gerry Kelly was “the most dominant figure” within the IRA leadership in 1996. Kelly is an MLA for North Belfast.

The recall of the file, following last year’s release of State files to the National Archives under the 20 and 30-year rules was, ordered on Wednesday by the Department of Foreign Affairs, The Irish Times understands.

The letter was written in May, 1996, by Noel Conroy, who then served as a Garda assistant commissioner in charge of its crime and security division, before serving as commissioner between 2003 and 2007.

“The current PIRA (Provisional Irish Republican Army) strategy continues to be dominated and controlled by the leadership of Gerry Kelly, Belfast; Brian Keenan, Belfast, Martin McGuinness, Derry; Pat Doherty, Donegal and Thomas ‘Slab’ Murphy, Louth,” wrote Conroy in a two-page letter on the IRA’s activities to the secretary general of the Department of Justice, Tim Dalton.

Kelly was jailed for the 1973 Old Bailey car bombing in London, but he has repeatedly denied being a member of the IRA after he was jailed. He was part of the Maze Prison escape in 1983.

The decision to pull the file back followed urgent consultations between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Justice, with initial doubts about which department had released the letter.

Questions have been submitted to the Department of Foreign Affairs about why the file has been withdrawn, but, so far, The Irish Times has not received a reply.

The files, which are released annually, are carefully vetted by serving and retired officials before they are sent to the National Archives. Documents can be withheld on a number of grounds, including if publication is deemed to be against the public interest.

The letter was published by The Irish Times on December 27th, 2025, as part of the first of several days of coverage of State papers from the National Archives in Dublin, its UK counterpart in London and the Public Records Office in Northern Ireland.

In the 1996 letter, Conroy went on: “Martin Ferris is also emerging as highly influential in formulating strategy and is consulted and advised by the northern leadership on all major issues.”

Conroy wrote that the leadership of the IRA wanted to be admitted to the talks with Northern Irish leadership: “Intelligence indicates that their military strategists have discussed methods which would allow them to be admitted.

“There is good intelligence to indicate that while there is some disagreement at Army Council level, a strategy is being developed that they calculate would allow for them being admitted.”

The head of the crime and security division of the Garda said the prospects for a second IRA ceasefire – which came in July, 1997 – were “considered to be good, provided that the decommissioning of arms is addressed to the satisfaction of PIRA/SF”.

2026: Opportunities and threats facing NI politicians

SAM MCBRIDE, NORTHERN IRELAND EDITOR, Belfast Telegraph, January 10th, 2026

THE NEXT 12 MONTHS WILL LIKELY SEE STORMONT STAGNATE, BUT A POTENTIAL TACTICAL WALKOUT AND A SPLINTERING ELECTORAL LANDSCAPE COULD RESHAPE LOCAL POLITICS AS THE EXECUTIVE FLOUNDERS

We'll see incessant political posturing as parties strut about hoping to catch the eye of the electorate. But there's no evidence that the Executive will manage what Michelle O'Neill and Emma Little-Pengelly said they should be judged on: delivery.

Here are some of the challenges and opportunities facing each of Northern Ireland's political leaders in 2026.

Michelle O'Neill

With great power comes great responsibility, and for O'Neill, her position at the head of the Executive makes her uniquely vulnerable as it becomes clear that the devolved administration is hapless. Blaming the DUP or the Government or partition will sometimes work, but even Sinn Fein's most loyal voter knows those factors don't explain the A5 debacle. This supposedly key priority has failed because Sinn Fein championed through climate change legislation without understanding it.

If the party loses in the Court of Appeal, it will be under intense pressure to accept the DUP's offer to ram through legislation to exempt the road from the climate law. But if it does that for the biggest infrastructure project in the history of Northern Ireland, it makes a mockery of the legislation Sinn Fein championed.

Equally awkward are O'Neill's 2024 words: “Casement Park will be built on my watch.”

Can she persuade the DUP to cut a deal which sees the stadium built in exchange for something else, or is the DUP too weakened to get away with giving Casement more money? The looming court judgment on Sinn Fein's attempt to get Irish language signage into Grand Central Station involves the risk that if it loses, questions about the capability of northern Sinn Fein will be reinforced, prompting unwelcome contrasts with the party's far slicker southern operation.

O'Neill also faces a tricky decision on going to the White House for St Patrick's Day. Weighed against her loathing for Donald Trump is the unique access this gives it to the world's top superpower and Sinn Fein's hope that one day America will help smooth the way to Irish unity.

Yet this year is also replete with possibility for Sinn Fein. Its role in Catherine Connolly's stunning Irish presidential victory means it's associated with success and the possibility of a new era of left-wing electoral cooperation of which it would likely be the greatest beneficiary.

However, Sinn Fein really needs to progress its case for Irish unity. A decade after the Brexit vote, saying “we need to have the conversation” or “there should be a border poll by 2030” sounds cliched and uninspiring.

If the Irish Government isn't going to plan for a border poll, Sinn Fein needs to find a way to either do some of the work itself or find others who will do it. President Connolly could be key to unlocking this.

She has no executive power, but can bring people together, focusing on this issue. However, will she prioritise unity, given her limited track record in this area?

A year from now, as the election looms, the divisions within unionism mean that Sinn Fein should still be comfortably the biggest party. That means it can lose votes without a collapse in seats.

Yet it could also conceal a vulnerability: if nationalists think Sinn Fein is guaranteed to remain the biggest party, and hasn't achieved much in government, what's going to energise them to come out to vote?

Gavin Robinson

Having taken over the DUP in circumstances where it was in danger of meltdown, Robinson has cannily stabilised the party in ways reminiscent of his namesake Peter Robinson. He has dabbled in more moderate positions but been willing to ruthlessly move back towards hardline stances as polling shows support shifting to the TUV. This has been effective in preventing sudden collapse, but isn't a coherent long-term plan.

Until now, Robinson has been finding his feet. This is the year where the DUP is firmly his party and he needs to get through to voters who he is and where he wants to take not just the DUP but Northern Ireland. Robinson is sufficiently young and capable to be leader into the 2040s or 2050s.

He could be leading unionism when a border poll is called, even if that doesn't happen for another 20 years.

But what he does over the next year and a half will shape public perception of him far into the future.

If he bungles this, clawing back what has been lost might be impossible.

As more elements of the Irish Sea border unfold, he will have to decide whether to finally admit that Brexit has been a disaster for unionism, and that the DUP misled its voters by claiming to have erased the sea border. Clever formulations of words haven't worked.

But an unvarnished apology would be a last resort; entering an election against Jim Allister after admitting the DUP helped undermine the Union would be excruciating.

More pressingly problematic for the DUP is the failure of the Stormont it restored after accepting the sea border. Paul Givan's education reforms are the most substantive evidence the party has of what it can achieve under devolution, but many people don't understand them, and even if they did, they might not view it as a vote-shifting ideological win.

The sour relationship with Sinn Fein contrasts unfavourably to the bonhomie of the early O'Neill-Pengelly days. Lurching from one to the other doesn't imply much strategy beyond self-preservation.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson's trial involves serious criminal charges which the former DUP leader has always denied and which will be decided by the legal system on the basis of the evidence put before a court. But regardless of how the case unfolds, or what the verdict is, the DUP will not relish such a trial unfolding perhaps just months before a major election.

Robinson needs a distinctive vision for his party which extends beyond 'vote for us or you get the Shinners'.

That didn't work last time; the polls suggest it's doomed to fail even more miserably this time.

Naomi Long

Naomi Long is testament to the most fundamental rule of democratic politics: What goes up one day comes down.

She was once Stormont's most capable and the most popular leader. She is one of the exceptional political talents of the post-Agreement era but increasingly appears to either be missing or getting things wrong — and getting indignant when opponents point that out.

The polls show the public tiring of Alliance; that could make party management challenging. Traditionally, Alliance has been unusually united, but as many MLAs realise their seats are under pressure because so many of them got in by slender margins, there will be pressure to change.

Already some MLAs seem to be taking matters into their own hands. But what can be changed? There's no sense Long is going to either resign or be challenged, and changing the perception of a leader is difficult late in their career, as Arlene Foster can attest.

One possibility is a tactical walk out from the Executive months before the election. This would go against Alliance's instincts to be a facilitator between the two communities but might be sold to voters on the basis that, unlike a resignation by the DUP or Sinn Fein, it wouldn't collapse devolution and would demonstrate resolve. After trying to get the DUP and Sinn Fein to agree to reform of Stormont and to clean up Lough Neagh, walking out would show that there are consequences to blocking its ministers.

The risk would be that it looked cynical and Alliance would be pressed on whether it would walk straight back in after an election. If it said no, then the tricky problem of the justice ministry could develop into no devolution at all — and that's awkward territory for Alliance.

UUP leader

Whoever this person might be, their fundamental challenge is defining the purpose of the party between the TUV and arguably the most moderate DUP there has ever been. If it's Jon Burrows — as seems likely — there is the potential for him to kick the party into shape or to blow it apart. Installing a leader just months after he joined the party would be an act of desperation, but its choices are limited and he has made an impression which demonstrates energy and the ability to communicate.

If there's evidence of a UUP rebound, the DUP is likely to talk up unionist unity, knowing this hurts the UUP.

It needs a clear answer to that offer — and clear evidence of what it's achieved by being part of this Executive.

​Claire Hanna

The SDLP had a strong 2025 under Hanna and Matthew O'Toole, two of Northern Ireland's sharpest political leaders.

But it will have been disappointed not to have substantially advanced despite the Executive's unpopularity. Instead, polling suggests voters are bypassing it for smaller parties.

Getting voters to recognise that it is in Stormont but outside the government system will be a key challenge. As the election looms, it needs a coherent answer to the question: if you get a few more MLAs elected, aren't you just going to be straight back into this Executive you denounce?

Hanna is putting far more emphasis on Irish unity planning. Sinn Fein is surprisingly vulnerable in this area, but it has the potential to discourage transfers from some soft unionists or Alliance voters.

Securing impressive new candidates would be a major boost.

Jim Allister

The TUV's idiosyncratic leader relishes proving critics wrong — and often does just that. Amid questions (including from yours truly) as to whether Allister's election to Westminster might be a curse disguised as a blessing because it would take him out of Stormont, Timothy Gaston has shown the party is no longer a one-man-band.

Belfast councillor Ron McDowell and Allister's long-standing right hand backroom man, Sammy Morrison, have come into their own while Allister still operates at an intensity which belies his 72 years.

The party is consistently polling at levels which hint at the potential for a changing of the guard within unionism. LucidTalk's last poll puts the party third, ahead of Alliance.

Allister's great challenge has always been finding credible candidates. He now has several of those, but to really press home his advantage, he would want some heavyweight new candidates — probably not from other parties, but from senior positions in business, the military, or professional backgrounds.

Mal O'Hara

O'Hara is the least well known of Northern Ireland's political leaders, but the one we're likely to be hearing much more from this year.

The Belfast councillor inherited a party falling towards irrelevance. After Clare Bailey's leadership was ended by the loss of both the party's MLAs, O'Hara has quietly rebuilt the Greens from the ground up. The University of Liverpool's survey a month ago put the party on 5.1%; the last LucidTalk poll had the party on 4%.

That might sound modest, but if accurate, it's sensational. It would represent the party's highest ever poll figure and more than double the 1.9% it got in the 2022 Assembly election.

Bailey's downfall involved allowing a resolutely non-tribal party to stand aside to help Sinn Fein win North Belfast in the 2019 General Election. O'Hara has been far more careful to maintain independence and relentlessly point to the environmental failures of the Executive. With Alliance struggling and the Executive floundering, the Greens could shock many people if they get their campaigning and candidate selection right.

Gerry Carroll

While not technically the leader (as in so many other areas, People Before Profit is different), Carroll is the party's highest profile NI figure. The socialist party has defied predictions of collapse to remain a defiant thorn in the flesh of the Stormont establishment — and especially the Sinn Fein part of that establishment — by articulating a thoroughly left-wing critique of why devolution is failing and why so many people feel they're losing economically.

Having survived backing Brexit despite taking most of its votes in nationalist areas, People Before Profit now has a real chance to grow. The recent University of Liverpool survey put the party on 2.6% — more than double its 2022 vote. If the party polled that next year, it would be expecting to re-take its Foyle seat and build bases in places like Upper Bann, where it has been increasingly active.

‘I miss Martin McGuinness greatly.’

Pat McArt, Irish News, January 10th, 2026

Rev David Latimer has no regrets over friendship

He paid a deep personal price for his friendship with Martin McGuinness, but almost a decade after the republican leader’s death, Presbyterian minister Rev David Latimer tells Pat McArt that he has no regrets

WE had agreed to meet at a wee café in Castlerock in Co Derry, but when I arrived I found David Latimer standing outside in freezing conditions. It was absolutely baltic.

“I don’t think it would be suitable for our conversation,” he says, pointing in the direction of the cozy café where it was clear just about everyone inside would hear our every word.

So, we decided to head down to what he described as “a nice quiet spot”, which turned out to be the local Church of Ireland, where we sat inside for well over an hour chatting – and teeth chattering – in what were almost equally ice-box conditions.

It was so cold that I decided we should go for a coffee where we originally planned to meet, and as we sat down David said the thing I regard as the main takeaway from our conversation.

“You know, Pat” he said quietly, as he was taking off his coat and scarf, “I have been retired for quite a few years now. Around here there are plenty of parishes with no ministers or struggling to get ministers, but I have never been asked to preach. Not once…”

It was not said in anger, but there was clearly a hurt there.

In the Presbyterian tradition, where preaching is at the very centre of the Gospel message, this is akin to being silenced.

And that, I presume, rightly or wrongly, is the personal price Reverend David Latimer has paid for his friendship with the late Martin McGuinness, the man said to have been the IRA’s chief-of-staff for many years.

A controversial appeal

It was controversial friendship from the outset, so how did it come about?

“First Derry Presbyterian church – the Presbyterian church in the Bogside, as I sometimes refer to it – is one of the most historic buildings in Derry. It has been on the go since 1690. It was closed in 2002 due to dry rot, but five years later it was still getting paint-bombed. This had been happening non-stop for years.

“One day I was visiting a parishioner and was told that there had been another attack. Back then we were supposed to keep our heads down, say nothing and get on with it. But I was fed up with this. Here it was, post the Good Friday Agreement and all that, yet my church was still getting attacked. So, I decided to go on to Radio Foyle and demand that it stopped.

“The interviewer said to me how was that going to happen, and I replied, ‘I am appealing to the one man in this town who can make it stop, Martin McGuinness’.”

Rev Latimer says he went home after that broadcast thinking nothing of it, that he had fulfilled his duty speaking out. He had done interviews before and nothing happened.

But he admits now that this 10-minute interview turned out to be life-changing.

“I got a call about an hour later from people in Sinn Féin saying Martin had heard what I said and wanted to meet me. I agreed, and about three hours later a ministerial car arrived at First Derry and out-jumped Deputy First Minister McGuinness.

“We had a polite enough meeting, but what I never expected was that I was meeting someone who I would come to have a friendship with that was as deep and rewarding as any I have had in my life.”

And here is where we come to the rub, the thing that was to dominate the rest of his life.

Was he naïve, thinking that a relationship with the former IRA man wouldn’t come at a cost? Was he some sort of Pollyanna person who saw good in everyone but was oblivious to the realities of life in a divided society? What was it?

‘We had a polite enough meeting, but what I never expected was that I was meeting someone who I would come to have a friendship with that was as deep and rewarding as any I have had in my life’

Not a useful idiot

“Believe me I have heard it all. That I am naïve. That I’m a ‘fluffy’ person. That I was in Sinn Féin’s back pocket. That a leopard never changes its spots and I was a useful idiot. That I had got into bed with a terrorist. I could keep going, I heard them all.

“Here’s the thing, I was none of those things.

“Five of my parishioners had been murdered by the IRA. And many of them believed Martin was responsible for that. I knew all about Martin’s history, and I knew the hurt in my community was deep and real. And that was of deep concern for me,” he added.

But David Latimer is of the belief that it was not how we start out in life, but how we finish. The Martin McGuinness he met that day for the first time at First Presbyterian was not the two-headed monster he had half-expected.

“He was very human, warm and friendly. I had some scones my wife made and I suggested a cup of tea. I had to get butter from the hotel across the road and it was as hard as concrete in those wee packs, so Martin suggested that while I concentrated on the buttering, he’d do the tea. It was the last thing I was expecting.

“Believe me when I say I think it’s often the simple things that tell you so much about the person you are dealing with.” And so it began. In the next few years, Martin McGuinness helped David Latimer secure major funding to restore First Derry. At its re-opening, Catholic clergy, for the first time ever, participated in the religious ceremony.

Things were happening from the ground up, not the top down.

And the former IRA leader and the Presbyterian minister had slowly become friends, meeting every so often for a chat and to keep each other informed.

‘People moved away from First Derry because of my friendship with Martin. It has cost me friends outside of the church. It’s a loss I have to acknowledge. But the many have stayed steadfast’

McGuinness even called out to the Latimer household on a couple of occasions, where his good manners charmed David’s wife by insisting on going into the kitchen, where she had stayed out of the way, to thank her for the delicious baked bread.

All these things, small in themselves, helped him gauge the person that was Martin McGuinness.

But if all this ecumenism on his part was pushing the boat out a fair bit into choppy waters, what the Reverend Latimer did in 2011 was beyond controversial.

Even turtles have to do it

He agreed to speak at the Sinn Féin Ard Fheis. Why did he agree? “I think it was former American president Jimmy Carter who said that the best fruit is the stuff that is out on the limb, and I remember being told that even a turtle has to stick its head out if it wants to move forward.

“When Martin asked me to, I thought about it a lot. I thought things were changing and that we all needed to take risks. I tossed and turned at night for a quite a while before reaching my decision. I said I would. But I still found the prospect daunting and complex. I am well used as a minister to public speaking, but this was something way out of my comfort zone.”

It was what happened next that hit the headlines across the globe.

He admits now that he hadn’t intended to say them, hadn’t scripted them, but out came the words as he looked towards Martin McGuinness before beginning his address: “Martin, I see you as one of the great leaders of modern times.”

And it was that comment, probably more than the content of his actual address, that caused the uproar.

The next morning’s News Letter ran the banner headline: “Latimer walks on victims’ graves”. How did he feel about that? “I knew that headline was very damaging. That it wasn’t good for me. I was worried about my family. What was even more daunting was that the next day I was doing service for the Royal Air Force Association who would be parading to First Derry for their annual remembrance service. I dreaded going to church that morning, never mind getting into the pulpit and preaching a sermon. I felt sick.

“Strangely enough, something happened and I got the strength to do it.

“Some people looked at me stony-faced, avoiding eye contact, but as I walked down the aisle a man caught my arm and whispered, ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’. I have never forgotten that.”

DAVID Latimer was born into a traditional unionist family in Dromore, Co Down in 1952. He’s married to Margaret – “my long suffering wife”, as he describes her – and has three daughters, one in London, one in Scotland and one in Derry.

He was the minister at First Derry for more than 30 years, unusual in the Presbyterian tradition where ministers usually move around quite a lot.

In fact, when he first was appointed to Derry, he recalls some comments along the lines that it was not a great appointment, “that I was a young man, going to an old man’s church”.

But on reflection he now thinks destiny played a part, that he was where he was meant to be at a time he was meant to be there.

“People moved away from First Derry because of my friendship with Martin. It has cost me friends outside of the church. It’s a loss I have to acknowledge. But the many have stayed steadfast.

“It would have been easy – very, very easy – to keep my head below the parapet. You know people sort of laughed when they heard the story of the former British army padre and the IRA leader being big friends. But here’s my view. If we stay safe in our silos nothing moves forward, nothing changes. Peace and reconciliation need risk-taking.“

Far from resiling from his comments at the Sinn Féin Ard Fheis, David Latimer today, in 2026, doubles down on them.

Members of PUL community trusted McGuinness

He pointed out that quite a few people in the ‘Protestant-Unionist– Loyalist’ community told him years ago – and many times since – that they wish Martin McGuinness was still around, that they trusted him to do what he said he would do. No other nationalist politician has, he believes, ever had that level of trust.

Latimer also points to how McGuinness led his community at a time of massive upheaval, to his relationship with Dr Ian Paisley, and how he took tough decisions in regard to recognising the need for support for the PSNI, and his decision to meet Queen Elizabeth. He doesn’t attempt to take any credit for any of that, but hopes his friendship played a role in helping McGuinness reach his decisions.

“I said to Martin one day that I valued our friendship. He caught my hand and said that he treasured it. I am very proud of that. I believe Martin was on a journey, like the rest of us. He certainly ended up a man of peace. Of that I am absolutely certain.

“I’ll repeat too something I said in my book, A Leap of Faith. I truly believe we have lost a very special human being, such as I have never seen in my life time. I miss him greatly.

“The big consolation for me is that I still have the friendship of Bernie, Martin’s wife, and his lovely family.” One final thing… David Latimer told in another interview – not with me – of a conversation he had with Baroness Eileen Paisley about life after death.

She remarked: “I think Heaven will be full of surprises. We’ll be surprised by the absences of people we expected to see, and equally surprised by the people we never expected to see.”

During our conversation it was clear he believes that to be true.

'She was not a violent person' - friends of ICE victim reject White House claims

JESSICA RICE, Belfast Telegraph, January 10th, 2026

US VICE PRESIDENT BLASTS MEDIA FOR 'FALSELY PORTRAYING VICTIM AS INNOCENT'

People in Northern Ireland who knew the woman shot dead by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer have rejected disparaging comments about her from the Trump administration.

Renee Nicole Good (37), a poet and mother of three, died in Minneapolis on Wednesday.

The shooting happened as she tried to drive away on a snowy residential street as officers were carrying out an operation linked to the US government's immigration crackdown.

About 20 years ago Ms Good spent time in Northern Ireland on Christian youth missions.

Youth pastor Paul Bowman and Rev James Hyndman from Saintfield spent time with Ms Good when she visited here.

‘Compassionate, caring and funny’

“She was a lovely, gentle, quiet, compassionate, creative young woman,” Rev Hyndman said.

Mr Bowman recalled how she excelled at writing. “She was compassionate, caring and funny. She was very much interested in writing poetry, that's what she went on to study,” he said. “She was definitely a gifted writer, I played music with her, she played with my kids.”

There has been controversy over comments from US government officials, including vice-president JD Vance, who claimed Ms Good's shooting had been justified, and was “a tragedy of her own making”.

Mr Bowman said the criticism did not match the young woman he had known.

Ms Good was a US citizen originally from Colorado Springs. An award-winning poet, she first came to Northern Ireland in her early teens and returned every summer until she was 19 in 2006.

“I really watched her grow up,” Mr Bowman said.

“She was with us for those very formative teenage years and the Renee I knew was nothing but kind and empathetic.”

Ms Good worked in the summer outreach teams at Ballysally Presbyterian Church, Coleraine, and First Saintfield Presbyterian Church.

On her last visit, Ms Good had extended her two-week trip to last the whole summer.

During that time, Mr Bowman took her for a scenic drive around Torr Head and the Antrim coast.

“It was a good day, she talked about her hopes and plans, a whole life lay ahead of her,” he added.

“It's devastating to think of that life being so violently snatched away.”

Mr Bowman heard the news from Ms Good's former youth pastor in Colorado.

‘Such a devastating thing to hear’

“He reached out to me and shared the news — it's such a devastating thing to hear, someone you knew so well facing such a violent tragedy,” he added.

Rev Hyndman, meanwhile, recognised Ms Good's face on the news.

“She was Renee Granger back in 2006 but I recognised her face and then I connected the dots,” he added.

“I just can't believe it, it just feels completely surreal and very, very difficult to take,” he said.

The Trump administration claimed ICE was acting in self-defence, labelling Ms Good a “domestic terrorist”.

Mr Vance said Ms Good was a “victim of left-wing ideology”.

“I can believe that her death is a tragedy while also recognising that it is a tragedy of her own making,” Mr Vance said.

Mr Vance said he was certain that Ms Good accelerated her car into the officer and hit him. It is not clear from the videos if the vehicle makes contact with the officer.

Was Victims fault

The vice president also said part of him felt “very, very sad” for Ms Good.

“I can believe that her death is a tragedy, while also recognising that it's a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left who have marshalled an entire movement — a lunatic fringe — against our law enforcement officers,” Mr Vance said.

He accused journalists of falsely portraying Ms Good as “innocent” and said: “You should be ashamed of yourselves. Every single one of you.”

Both Rev Hyndman and Mr Bowman said the critical comments from US government officials and others do not align with the woman they knew.

“It's 20 years since I saw Renee but the person that I knew was a lovely, gracious, kind and creative young person who cared about others,” Rev Hyndman said.

‘I don’t recognise caricature’

“I don't recognise the caricature that's been painted in some media circles.”

Mr Bowman said: “My memories of her are of a very different person than she's being characterised in certain quarters.

“I understand it's been a long time since I've seen her and people change over time, but they don't change that much.

“I have watched the videos from the incident, we don't know what was exactly going on and hopefully we get that investigation that people are asking so we find out what was happening.

“She had a great sense of justice and social justice, informed by her faith — she was not a violent person. She was not an angry person.

“The person I think of when I think of Renee could not be described as a domestic terrorist or a radical extremist, that's just not who she was.”

There have been several anti-ICE protests across America following Ms Good's death.

Mr Bowman hopes her death will not be used to stoke tensions in America.

“I just hope it doesn't lead to more violence — knowing Renee, that's not something she would have wanted,” he said.

Pastor remembers Minnesota shooting victim as creative and compassionate

CLAUDIA SAVAGE, Irish News, January 10th, 2026

A NORTHERN Irish pastor who worked with the 37-year-old woman killed by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer has described her as “quiet-natured” and “compassionate”.

Renee Nicole Good, a poet and mother of three from Minneapolis, spent some time in Northern Ireland as a religious missionary.

She was fatally shot while she tried to drive away on a snowy residential street as officers were carrying out an operation related to US President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

US Vice-President JD Vance has blamed her death on “a left-wing network”, Democrats, the media and Ms Good herself as protests related to her death expanded to cities across the country.

Ms Good was a US citizen born in Colorado and appears to never have been charged with anything involving law enforcement beyond a traffic ticket.

On social media she described herself as a “poet and writer and wife and mom”.

Reverend James Hyndman met Ms Good when she came to Northern Ireland on a mission trip from Village Seven Presbyterian Church in Colorado in the summer of 2006.

He was then the minister of First Presbyterian Church in Saintfield and is currently the minister of First Presbyterian Church in Coleraine.

“She was a lovely, lovely girl,” he told the Press Association.

“She would have probably been about 17, 18, I think, whenever she came to us.

“A quiet-natured girl, very creative, a very compassionate person and very quickly and easily built relationships with children and young people. She was a lovely girl.”

Vigils have been held for Renee Nicole Good, who was shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minnesota

He added: “She loved to build relationships and I suppose she was here experiencing what life in Northern Ireland was like, and for young people in Northern Ireland giving them an idea of what life was like in other places, that kind of intercultural experience.

“She still has friendships here right across Northern Ireland, people who remember and would still be in touch with her, and I think everybody’s just deeply, deeply shocked and stunned at the tragedy of all of this.”

Ms Good had just dropped off her six-year-old son at school on Wednesday and was driving home with her current partner when they encountered a group of Ice agents on a snowy street in Minneapolis.

Video taken by bystanders posted to social media shows an officer approaching her car, demanding she open the door and grabbing the handle.

When she begins to pull forward, a different Ice officer standing in front of the vehicle pulls his weapon and immediately fires at least two shots into the vehicle at close range.

Asked how he felt when he saw the news and footage of Ms Good’s shooting, Mr Hyndman said: “It’s a surreal experience to see someone that you knew and lived alongside for a few months whose life has ended so tragically, it really is.

“Our hearts go out to her family at this time and our thoughts and prayers are with them.”

The shooting happened on the second day of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown on the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul, which Homeland Security said is the biggest immigration enforcement operation ever.

Ms Good’s death – at least the fifth tied to immigration sweeps since Mr Trump took office – has resonated far beyond Minneapolis as protests took place or were expected this week in many large US cities.

People took to the streets and marched in freezing rain on Thursday night down one of Minneapolis’ major thoroughfares, chanting “Ice out now” and holding signs saying, “killer ice off our streets”.

PSNI pen drive in a charity shop bag

CONNLA YOUNG CRIME AND SECURITY CORRESPONDENT, Irish News, January 10th, 2025

FRESH concerns about how the PSNI handle sensitive data have been raised after a pen drive believed to be linked to a specialist protection unit was handed into a charity shop in Co Down.

The data device, believed to be linked to the PSNI’s Close Protection Unit (CPU), was contained in a bag donated to the shop in Newtownards last year, The Irish News has learned.

The CPU provides security cover for high-profile public figures, who are often referred to as ‘principals’.

As well as providing security for senior politicians, legal and other figures, the CPU is also tasked with protecting visiting dignitaries, including members of the British royal family.

When asked if the data device was linked to the CPU, and if the information contained on it included material connected to a visit by a member of the royal family, the PSNI did not provide a direct response.

Police have confirmed they received a report after the “discovery of a pen drive in a handbag which had been donated to a charity shop” in the Co Down town in September.

A spokeswoman for the Policing Board said it was not notified about the potential data breach.

A spokeswoman for the PSNI said that “as a result of the return of the pen drive and subsequent internal enquiries, there was no evidence of any likely risk or impact to anyone”.

“The internal investigation concluded this did not meet the criteria for notification to the Information Commissioner’s Office and in turn any key stakeholders,” the spokeswoman added.

Operational security

It is understood that in advance of visits by high-profile ‘principals’, including British royals, detailed briefings are often provided to CPU staff. These can incorporate details of the itinerary and sensitive tactical methodologies, including specialised equipment and resources to be deployed.

‘PSNI must show lessons have been learned’

When asked if a review of the incident had been carried out, the PSNI again did not provide a direct response.

Last month, Stormont chiefs agreed to set aside almost £120 million for PSNI data breach payouts after the details of 10,000 staff members were inadvertently posted online in 2023.

SDLP Policing Board member Colin McGrath said he is concerned by the discovery of the data device.

“The control and management of data within the police service is a matter of real concern,” he said.

“While I appreciate that the PSNI is a large and complex organisation, it is difficult to justify sensitive information being stored indefinitely on something as portable and easily misplaced as a data pen. In an era where secure, cloud-based systems are widely available and routinely used to protect highly sensitive material, this approach feels outdated and unnecessarily risky.”

Mr McGrath said alarm bells should be sounding within the PSNI.

“The fact that such a device could end up in a handbag purchased from a charity shop should act as a clear wake-up call,” he said.

“The public quite rightly expects better safeguards for sensitive policing information, and the PSNI must now demonstrate that lessons have been learned from this incident and the data breach that leaked so much sensitive information putting officers and staff at risk.”

From young republican fleeing to US in 1980s to head of Belfast property empire

JOHN BRESLIN, Irish News, January 10th, 2026

A COMPANY led by a prominent Irish-American businessman who fled Northern Ireland as a young republican has emerged as a major landlord in west Belfast, with a multi-million pound property portfolio.

Sean Mackin’s company, which has close links to a leading estate agent in the area, has bought dozens of properties across the city, mostly in the west, since setting up just over a decade ago. The properties are worth close to £4m.

It is a remarkable journey for the New York-based businessman who fled Ireland as a young man in the early 1980s after repeated arrests and claimed torture. He spent years fighting deportation back to the north in one of the most high-profile cases of its type at the time.

In 1992, Mr Mackin became the first Irish republican during the most recent conflict to successfully fight deportation from the US on political grounds. His wife and children were granted political asylum, also a first.

This followed an eight year legal battle that drew support from leading politicians, Irish-American journalists and lawyers in the US and the north, including solicitor Pat Finucane, who travelled to New York to deliver testimony on Mr Mackin’s behalf just three months before his murder in February 1989.

Mr Mackin became the founder and is the current chair of the New York Irish Center and is a long-time and committed supporter of Friends of Sinn Féin, the US fundraising and lobbying arm of the party.

In 2014, the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform honoured Mr Mackin for his work on behalf of the undocumented Irish.

Grand Marshel of St Patrick’s Day Parade

He was publicly honoured by the US Congress after being named Grand Marshall of the 2017 St Patrick’s Day parade in his adopted hometown of Eastchester, New York.

The 67-year-old, who has run a successful plumbing business out of The Bronx for the last 20 years, declined to speak to The Irish News about his journey and achievements since his flight from the north in 1983.

But it has emerged the father-of-three has made a significant impact on his native Belfast as a major player in the city’s property market after building up a portfolio of dozens of homes in the city, according to land registry filings.

103 Royal Avenue in Belfast city centre, one of the properties owned by companies led by Sean Mackin

Scarsdale Properties LLP, of which Mr Mackin is a designated member along with his wife and two children, has investment properties worth £3.7m.

The principal business of the company, incorporated in 2015, is property letting, latest annual accounts filed on Monday report. The company has close links to Northern Property, with which it shares a Falls Road office.

A separate company, also with a registered office in the Northern Property premises, owns a major property in the city centre, at the corner of North Street and Royal Avenue. This company reported non-current assets, property, plant and equipment, of £1.2m.

Northern Property has been subjected to sinister online attacks linked to the cost of renting in Belfast.

Sean Mackin could hardly have imagined in the early ’80s in his native west Belfast that he would now lead a company that owned such a significant number of properties in the same area.

In interviews with US journalists during his fight against deportation, Mr Mackin said he joined the republican movement aged either 11 or 12.

IRSP

In the years leading up to his leaving for the US, he was associated with the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP), the political wing of the INLA.

Many of those involved with the IRSP and the INLA at that time later died in internal feuds.

Newspaper reports, including ones by noted Irish-American columnists Dennis Hamill and Jim Dwyer, recount how Mr Mackin was arrested multiple times, spent 22 months in confinement but was never charged with any offence.

He described to Hamill one arrest: “It was 5.30 am and there was a knock on the door and the soldiers came in and took me from my bed and took me to the barracks in Andersontown, where I got my first beating. Punches and slaps to the face. Pulled my hair.

“Then they asked me to give information on people I knew nothing about. So they turned me over to the RUC at Castlereagh in Belfast.

“Then it really started. I was pulled around the cell by the hair and they alternated beatings with interrogations. I was forced to do exercises; push-ups and squatting until I couldn’t stand.

“ It was 5.30 am and there was a knock on the door and the soldiers came in and took me from my bed and took me to the barracks in Andersontown, where I got my first beating

“When I still refused to confess to their trumped-up charges they slapped and punched me, threw me to the ground by my hair and kicked living hell out of me and shouted ‘admit it, you b*****d’.”

Multiple reports state that Mr Mackin was one of the five most serious cases of torture cited in a blistering 1978 Amnesty International investigation. The Amnesty report, however, does not identify the individuals it concluded were tortured by the security forces.

Mr Mackin told reporters he left for the US after receiving a death threat in the form of a Christmas card.

In 1992, a federal immigration judge in Manhattan suspended the deportation of Mr Mackin and granted his family political asylum.

Immigration lawyers said they would not appeal, effectively making the family the first political refugees from the north, his lawyer said.

On a visit to Belfast in 2004, Mr Mackin, by then a US citizen, was controversially arrested by the PSNI and questioned about the 1983 murder of RUC reservist Colin Carson outside Cookstown RUC station.

It caused an uproar among his supporters in the US, including congressmen, with one calling for a State Department investigation. He was quickly released.

That alone illustrates how far the young radical, now local property magnate, had travelled.

We have returned to the Dark Ages

PATRICK MURPHY, Irish News, January 10th, 2026

TAKING control of Venezuela today, Greenland tomorrow and Cuba the next day – that’s Donald Trump’s foreign policy and there is plenty more where that came from.

You may disapprove of his actions, but there is a new world order out there and neither Britain, Ireland, nor the EU know how to deal with it.

Trump’s strategy is simple: he wants to carve up the world in the same way that criminal gangs divide up territories in cities, with the odd confrontation (over an oil tanker, for example).

He sees global affairs in terms of economic competition between three gangs – the US, China and Russia.

The US will take control of what he calls “our hemisphere”, meaning North and South America and their adjoining islands.

China and Russia can carve up Africa and Asia between them.

Europe, if you’ll forgive the language, can go to hell.

In global geopolitics, Europe is now the insignificant rump of the Eurasian landmass and the EU is not part of Trump’s vision for a new world.

In 1990 Europe constituted 25% of global economic output. Today that figure has fallen to 14%, making the EU just a theme park.

The EU’s statement on Venezuela failed to criticise Trump. In Britain, renowned lawyer Keir Starmer refused to say that Trump had broken international law.

Starmer is Britain’s new Neville Chamberlain, who thought it was better to appease Hitler than confront him.

The EU is currently putting together a coalition (including Britain and Ireland) to fight Putin in Ukraine, but not Trump in Greenland, even though its people are EU citizens through their Danish nationality.

The EU failed to stand up to Trump’s tariffs, unlike China, Brazil and Canada. Now he can ignore Europe’s flattery.

As Henry Kissinger said, being America’s enemy may be dangerous, but being its friend is fatal.

So why is Trump so obsessed with foreign aggression right now? The answer lies in three inter-related elements.

His personality explains his style, American history explains his actions, and the mid-term elections next November explain his timing.

Donald Trump is Venezuela’s new dictator

Trump has enough personality traits to keep a team of psychologists occupied for years.

Some say he is a megalomaniac, obsessed with power, as evidenced by America’s 626 reported air strikes across the world last year.

Others highlight his narcissism in his love of himself, and there are those who say he is really a solipsist – someone who loves himself so much that he even enjoys criticism, because he remains as the centre of attraction.

In US history, his policy is nothing new. America invaded Mexico in 1847 and stole half its territory, including what is now California, Nevada, Utah and parts of four other states.

US troops occupied Cuba twice from 1906 to 1922. They invaded Haiti in 1915 and Panama in 1989. Invading neighbouring (or indeed any) countries is nothing new for the US, usually in the name of freedom.

Meanwhile, Trump is “running” Venezuela in the cause of democracy, while refusing to allow elections there. He is the country’s new dictator.

The next stage in Trump’s reincarnation of Genghis Khan may include taking over Greenland.

Under existing treaties, the US can maintain military bases there and extract minerals and other natural resources. Trump’s only reason for taking over Greenland, therefore, is because he can. He is the sort of person who gives megalomaniacs a bad name.

Mid Term Elections

So why these foreign incursions now? The answer is that they are an attempt to regain support ahead of November’s mid-term elections.

Current opinion polls indicate his Republican Party will lose control of Congress. This would not just remove much of Trump’s personal power, it would also expose him to impeachment on several issues since his second term started.

When in difficulty at home, bomb somebody abroad.

So where will it all end? Trump aims to establish a commercial hinterland whose resources, markets, and supply chains remain under American control.

Venezuela’s (and Canada’s) vast oil reserves, minerals, and strategic location are much higher in Trump’s priorities than democracy, international law, or human rights.

Despite that, the EU, Britain and Ireland are clearly on Trump’s side, because they failed to condemn his illegal actions in Venezuela.

US military aircraft will continue to re-fuel at Shannon and when Micheál Martin brings Trump shamrock on St Patrick’s Day, he will not mention the wars.

Might has once again become right. We have returned to the Dark Ages and it may be a while before any leader in this hemisphere has the courage to light a candle.

What would happen to the BBC and RTÉ in a united Ireland?

By Stephen Baker and Phil Ramsey, Irish News, January 9th, 2026

WITH growing talk of a future border poll, we need to think about what might lie beyond it, especially if voters chose to end partition.

Any plan for new constitutional arrangements will probably prioritise issues like healthcare, taxation and policing.

But to undertake a political transformation of such a size and type without a plan for the national media would be politically reckless.

It is no coincidence that modern national democracies arose in an era of mass communication.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, readers and audiences were informed and entertained by newspapers, journals and literature, and later on by cinema, radio and television.

At a deeper level, dramas, news and stories of every variety made nations imaginable in the minds of people and turned public opinion into a democratic force to be reckoned with.

In the early 20th century, governments in both the UK and the newly formed Irish Free State saw it in their respective national interest to establish public broadcasters. They also set out regulations for the media within their sphere of influence.

But in the 21st century, those old media institutions and laws are suffering a crisis of legitimacy.

The public is increasingly politically polarised. Culture, once conceived of as an improving influence on the national life, is now the stuff of ‘wars’ rooted in notions of identity.

Fragmentation

Meanwhile, audiences are fragmenting across time, space and media platforms. A people who once communed around the national evening news might just as likely these days be grazing TikTok content.

If appears an unpropitious time to embark on building a new public media and a democratic national culture in Ireland.

This is a moment beset by global media giants, owned by powerful, wealthy, and occasionally bad faith actors who trade in political destabilisation.

But this is why we need to think seriously and urgently about a robust, sustainable and democratic public media system.

The challenges are not just global. They are also domestic. A united Ireland would in effect be a new nation and fledgling democracy, with a complex history of colonialism, partition and violent sectarianism to address.

With this in mind, and to begin that conversation about how the media would be organised in a united Ireland, researchers at Ulster University and Dublin City University will be publishing a report: Public Media Ireland: a New PSM Organisation for a New Country.

There are various options. Some assume that in the event of a united Ireland, RTÉ would simply take over from the BBC in the north. Others imagine that BBC Northern Ireland would carry on as it is currently constituted.

However, with our colleagues Dr Dawn Wheatley and Dr Roddy Flynn from Dublin City University, we argue that in the event of a united Ireland there should be a new public media organisation – tentatively called Public Media Ireland (PMI).

What to preserve?

There is, of course, much about RTÉ and BBC NI that is worth preserving – technical resources and assets, but especially people with skills, knowledge and expertise.

Public service media is ultimately comprised of the people who put the nightly news on air, and whose voices are so familiar on the radio.

But there also needs to be change. The new organisation necessarily needs to be a properly democratic, designed to serve a democratic society.

This might mean a chair, director-general and board appointed by the legislature rather than the government, with a space for elected trade union representatives on the board.

Also, an enhanced role for a media regulator and better pathways for audiences to impact the strategic direction of Public Media Ireland.

Who pays?

The thorniest question is ‘How will this be paid for?’ Our report is adamant: any media organisation with the aspirations to serve democratic national life should be well funded, non-commercial and sustainable.

We look to the Finnish model, where individuals pay a percentage of their earned and capital income each year, and where organisations also fund that nation’s media.

In a country with a smaller population than what a united Ireland would have, the Finnish broadcaster YLE has significantly more income than RTÉ and BBC Northern Ireland combined.

There is another way to look at funding, and that is to ask: ‘Given how integral a healthy media sphere is to democratic national life, what price would you put on your democracy?’

This might have appeared an idealistic way to look at it in an era when Western democracies appeared stable and confident in their integrity. It is a fundamental question as democracies look fragile and torn apart by forces that set people against one another. In Ireland, we need no lessons about where that can lead.

This is the moment to consider the mission of a new public service media organisation in Ireland, one that is democratically enriching; one that pushes beyond the merely multicultural to give voice to the intercultural aspects of modern Irish life.

In that vision, difference would be actively embraced, celebrated and fundamentally constitutive of a united Ireland in the 21st century.

None of this is easy. There are bitter legacies to navigate and future challenges to confront.

But Ireland’s past, present and future is so much harder to contemplate without a media capable of contributing to a rich, participatory democracy – one that aspires to be both truthful and as culturally creative and convivial as the people who live here.

Stephen Baker and Phil Ramsey are lecturers at Ulster University’s School of Communication and Media

Top dissident republican is charged with having child abuse images

BRETT CAMPBELL, Belfast Telegraph, January 10th, 2026

ALAN LUNDY DUE IN COURT ACCUSED OF FIVE OFFENCES EXCLUSIVE

An alleged New IRA chief currently on bail waiting to stand trial for the attempted murder of DCI John Caldwell has been charged with making and possessing child abuse images.

THREE OF THE FIVE CHARGES RELATE TO ALAN LUNDY'S ALLEGED POSSESSION OF 'EXTREME PORNOGRAPHIC' VIDEOS

The alleged New IRA commander waiting to stand trial for the attempted murder of DCI John Caldwell is due to appear in court on a raft of offences including two child sex image charges next week.

Alan Lundy, one of 17 suspects charged in connection with the shooting of the now retired senior PSNI officer in Omagh nearly three years ago, is due to appear before Belfast Magistrates Court on Thursday.

The 46-year-old, with an address at Glenburn View in Dungannon, faces five counts related to making and possessing indecent images.

Three of the charges pertain to the defendant's alleged possession of “extreme pornographic” videos on dates ranging from July 19, 2017 to February 16, 2019.

A fourth charge alleges that the senior dissident made an indecent image of a child, namely a video, on September 24, 2017.

Lundy faces a further charge of possessing an indecent photograph of a child on an unknown date between December 31, 2012 and February 16, 2019.

His upcoming case at Laganside Courthouse is listed as a preliminary enquiry first appearance which means it could potentially be elevated to the Crown Court.

The defendant is waiting to be tried for the attempted murder of DCI Caldwell who spent weeks critically ill in hospital after being approached by two gunmen outside a sports complex in Omagh on February 22, 2023 while accompanied by his young son.

The assailants inflicted life-changing injuries on the detective who had just finished coaching an under-15s football team and was loading equipment into the boot of his car at the time of the attack.

The New IRA later claimed responsibility stating that “an active service unit was in position to target the enemy within our chosen kill zone with our armed volunteers giving cover”.

Lundy, with a previous address on Flax Street in the Ardoyne area of Belfast, remains on bail after appearing in court accused of attempted murder, directing the activities of a proscribed organisation and assisting in the preparation of an act of terror. He is one of seven men accused of attempted murder.

The case is next listed for mention at Omagh Courthouse on January 20 amid concerns expressed by defence lawyers about delays.

National Executive of Saoradh

The suspect is described by Saoradh — the political wing of the New IRA — as its “national executive member”.

A post on the group's website expressed solidarity with the alleged dissident commander — who it claimed “was interned by a British court” despite the defendant being granted bail.

It describes Lundy — whose father Alan Lundy Sr was a prominent Sinn Fein member when he was murdered by the UDA while carrying out building work at the home of his friend, former Stormont Speaker Alex Maskey, in May 1993 — as “a lifelong republican activist, ex-prisoner and the son of an IRA volunteer”.

The website claims that the defendant's legal team “reacted with incredulity” when their client was charged in connection with the DCI Caldwell probe due to the “complete lack of 'evidence' put to him during his interrogation”.

The paranoid rant contains claims that Lundy is the “latest victim of Britain's new conveyor belt in Ireland” which seeks to “intern republicans for years on end” before eventually freeing them on “heavily restrictive” bail conditions “and ultimately acquits them”.

Saoradh also claimed that the goal of the alleged conspiracy is not about securing convictions but stopping “activism” as part of a disruptive strategy it said is supported by “an ever-willing Sinn Fein”.

“Nothing will break Alan, the state can be sure of that,” it vowed in February 2024.

Lundy was released on High Court bail in July that year after initially being remanded into custody.

He was left deflated last February after his plans for a romantic weekend with his partner fell flat.

A judge blocked the defendant's request to be allowed to enjoy a Valentine's Day getaway in Newry's Canal Court Hotel.

The bid to have his curfew and residence conditions varied provoked strong objections from prosecutors who highlighted the serious nature of the case against Lundy and expressed concerns over his failure to comply with previous bail variation conditions granted in September 2024.

‘Missed the bus’

Dungannon Magistrates Court was told the defendant claimed he “missed the bus” to explain why he failed to return home by 10pm after being permitted to sign bail in Belfast due to a family funeral.

The court heard that Lundy was located by police in his mother's house in the city at 5.20am the next day.

DCI Caldwell was awarded the King's Police Medal in November 2024 by the Princess Royal at a ceremony in Buckingham Palace after being named in the King's Birthday Honours list.

“I'm feeling very happy, feel very privileged, feel very honoured to be, firstly nominated, and then to receive such a very nice medal from the King,” he said after receiving the accolade in recognition of gallantry and distinguished service.

“I've been impacted, obviously, the attack upon me: I was shot nine times.

“I'm still recovering from those injuries.

“But the recovery is going very well. That's thanks to the medical teams and thanks to the support from family and friends and from my wife and my son.”

Irish passport recall for almost 13,000 new holders 

PAUL AINSWORTH, Irish News, January 10th, 2026

THOUSANDS of new Irish passport holders could find themselves unable to travel in the days ahead after a blunder left recently issued booklets “not fully compliant with international travel standards”.

Applicants who received new passports printed over the Christmas and New Year period have been contacted to warn them they “may have an issue at eGates and border control when travelling”.

The Republic’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFA), which runs the Passport Service, has confirmed to The Irish News that a total of 12,904 passports printed and issued between December 23 and January 6 were “impacted by this technical issue with a software update”.

Passports issued outside of these dates were not impacted, they said.

The Passport Service has apologised over the errors, and notified border authorities around the world in order to “mitigate against any possible travel issues”.

A Belfast-based family were among those with a member to have received a newly issued passport recently in the post.

The holder received an email yesterday warning that the passport was not compliant.

“We sincerely regret this error and wish to apologise for the inconvenience it has caused to you,” the email read.

They were told: “In order to ensure that you do not face any issues with travel, it is important that we re-issue your passport as soon as possible.

Replacement Passports

“You do not need to re-apply, simply return your passport book (and passport card if applicable) and we will send you a new passport book (and card).”

The holder, who wished to remain anonymous, said: “Thankfully this won’t impact travel plans for us, but there must be a lot who had received a new passport with the intention of travelling soon afterwards.

“We can only imagine the hassle this would cause for people turning up to an airport only to find out that they can’t fly out.

The Irish Passport Service have issued an apology and urged those impacted to return booklets and cards immediately

“We feel the Passport Service should also be on top of reissuing new passports immediately, not requesting those who have been affected to post off their passports in order to get a new one.”

A DFA spokesperson said: “The Passport Service is aware of an issue affecting passports issued between 23 December 2025 and 6 January 2026.

“Due to a technical issue with a software update, passports issued between 23 December 2025 and 6 January 2026 inclusive are not fully compliant with international travel standards and there is a possibility that some passport holders may have an issue at eGates and border control when travelling.

“The Passport Service sincerely regrets this issue and apologises to affected citizens for the inconvenience caused.

“In order to mitigate against any possible travel issues, the passport service has notified border authorities worldwide through the International Civil Aviation Organisation, as well as Irish Border Management.”

SDLP MLA Mark H Durkan said he expects a “significant number” of those impacted would be from the north.

“Given the large number of people travelling at this time of year this could have been disastrous for people travelling on newly issued passports who did not realise this error,” he said.

“I would urge anyone impacted to return their passports immediately so that they can be replaced to avoid any issues in future.

“The Irish passport office must prioritise replacements and ensure this process is swift and seamless.”

'Once tracks are lifted, they are gone for good': Plea to minister on greenway plan

AMY COCHRANE, Belfast Telegraph, January 10th, 2026

PROPOSED PATH TO LINK DOWNPATRICK TO ARDGLASS 'SPELLS END FOR RAIL HOPES'

A heritage railway charity has appealed to the Infrastructure Minister for heritage transport to be given equal opportunities for funding compared to active travel projects.

Earlier this week, Infrastructure Minister Liz Kimmins announced funding of over £1m to support three councils to deliver seven active travel projects, one of which was for a greenway to be installed along the old railway line from Downpatrick to Ardglass.

Robert Gardiner is chairman of the Downpatrick and County Down Railway (DCDR) charity and said that, although he is not opposed to the installation of greenways in principle, having one on the former railway line from Downpatrick to Ardglass attracts some safety issues and constricts any future development of the railway.

The volunteer-run charity was set up in 1985 as a working railway museum and tourist attraction after the former Belfast and County Down Railway ceased operating in 1950.

Mr Gardiner explained that the charity was initially going to be called the Downpatrick and Ardglass Railway.

“Ardglass was part of the original vision, although we set aside any active plans to extend the line in that direction due to the lack of support along the route,” he explained.

“That said, introducing a greenway along the former Ardglass alignment would make it extremely difficult for any future use of the corridor for railway purposes to be considered.

“We would welcome the feasibility work also examining alternative, non-conflicting uses of the trackbed.”

The £1m funding from DfI — 50% capital funding of the total costs with the other 50% to be met by councils or other sources - is to be awarded to three councils — Derry City and Strabane District Council, Belfast City Council and Newry, Mourne and Down District Council — to help deliver on their priorities for active travel.

The projects to benefit from the £1m funding are Sydenham Greenway in Belfast and also within Newry, Mourne and Down District Council greenways from Newry to Poyntzpass and Ballynahinch 'Spur'.

In Derry City and Strabane District Council the funding will go towards lighting projects along Bay Road Greenway, Drumahoe Park and Greenway and Foyle Valley Greenway — the last of which is also along the line of a former heritage railway. Mr Gardiner said: “It is important to reiterate that we're not opposed to greenways in principle, our concern is where proposals could affect an operational heritage railway corridor that already delivers tourism value.

“A relevant example is the Foyle Valley Railway, which operated as a heritage railway on the former Great Northern Railway corridor from 1986 until the early 2000s but faced health and safety challenges associated with public access along the alignment.

“It became the Foyle Valley Greenway, illustrating the difficulties of sustaining operational heritage railways where adjacent public paths are introduced.”

Mr Gardiner said he was previously promised by both Ms Kimmins and former Infrastructure Minister John O'Dowd that greenways wouldn't be placed on tracks around Downpatrick.

“They both said there were no plans for greenways near us,” he said.

“We want to engage constructively on this; if this feasibility work is genuinely about exploring options, then it is essential that existing railway operations, safety requirements and long-term heritage value are fully considered from the outset, rather than treated as constraints after decisions have already been made.”

Mr Gardiner outlined that there are some safety concerns installing a greenway on the old track from Downpatrick to Ardglass.

“Placing a greenway alongside a single-track heritage railway introduces a range of safety, operational and legal risks that are difficult to manage,” he said, adding that, if any incident were to occur between a train using the track and members of the public using the greenway, liability would lie with the railway.

“Once a multi-use path or greenway is established, reversing that use to reintroduce rail infrastructure typically faces resistance, even where rail restoration may be technically feasible — once those tracks are lifted, that's them lifted for good.”

This is not the first time Newry, Mourne and Down District Council proposed a greenway along the same line from Downpatrick to Ardglass.

In 2016, the council announced funding from DfI for feasibility studies into three greenways; Downpatrick to Comber, Downpatrick to Newcastle and Downpatrick to Ardglass but they did not move forward due to widespread opposition.

A DfI spokesperson said of the recent announcement: “Funding for three projects was awarded to Newry, Mourne and Down District Council (NMDDC), including for a proposed Downpatrick-Ardglass greenway which forms a section of the identified Comber to Newcastle and Ardglass via Downpatrick route in the Department's Strategic Plan for Greenways published in 2016.

“The council would be best placed to provide further information regarding project timescales and potential route options that may be considered through scheme development.”

A spokesperson for Newry, Mourne and Down District Council said they are “currently preparing a press release on the recent award of funding from the Department for Infrastructure to undertake feasibility studies on three Greenways, including Downpatrick to Ardglass” but were unable to provide this at the time of going to press.

Robinson criticises Irish minister’s ‘clear challenge’ to UK on Legacy Bill

By Rebecca Black, Press Association, Belfast News Letter, January 10th, 2026

DUP leader Gavin Robinson has criticised the Irish foreign minister’s “clear challenge” to the UK over legislation to tackle the Northern Ireland Troubles.

Mr Robinson urged Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer against “spinelessly surrendering” to the Irish Republic as work continues on the Bill.

He was speaking after Helen McEntee said during a visit to Parliament Buildings in Belfast that any significant changes to the legislation must have the full agreement of both governments.

Sir Keir had indicated that new protections for military veterans will be added to the Northern Ireland Troubles Bill his Government is taking through Parliament.

The joint framework on legacy announced by London and Dublin last September outlined a range of measures and mechanisms for dealing with historical cases from the Northern Ireland conflict.

The framework included commitments to fundamentally reform the structures established by the last Conservative government’s contentious Legacy Act, including the removal of a controversial provision that offered a form of conditional immunity to perpetrators of Troubles crimes.

At the same time it published the framework, the Labour Government also announced a separate set of proposals it described as “new protections, rights and safeguards for Northern Ireland veterans”.

The measures included allowing witnesses who participate in new legacy processes the option to give evidence remotely without travelling to Northern Ireland.

Ms McEntee said what was agreed in September “is a very fine balance” resulting from a “huge amount of work”.

“We are very clear as a government that in transposing that agreement and putting it into legislation, there cannot be any significant changes that shift that balance,” she added.

Need to protect veterans

In a communication to DUP party members, Mr Robinson said he had challenged the Prime Minister to ensure that the legislation “must properly protect our veterans”.

He paid tribute to military veterans for “putting their lives on the line to protect others and uphold the rule of law”.

“They deserve gratitude and respect, not the prospect of legal jeopardy decades later,” he said.

“It is vital that any legal framework clearly distinguishes between those who upheld the law and those who sought to undermine it through terrorism and violence. To blur that line is morally wrong and unjust.

“The Prime Minister indicated that the Government would bring forward amendments to address these concerns.

“Of course, within minutes, the foreign minister of the Irish Republic responded to say any change required their support.

“That’s a clear challenge to the Prime Minister – will he side with sovereignty and protect our armed forces or spinelessly surrender to the Republic who have delivered nothing for victims?”

Mr Robinson was also critical of Stormont Finance Minister John O’Dowd’s draft budget.

He said the document was published without Executive agreement, and “cannot be treated as settled”.

“While we recognise the real financial pressures facing Northern Ireland, the priorities John O’Dowd has chosen raise serious concerns,” he said.

“Public services, particularly education, are under severe strain, and significant changes will be required before this budget could ever secure DUP support.

“Northern Ireland must also show it can deliver major infrastructure projects if we are serious about investment, jobs, and economic growth.”

Kingsmill massacre reflected vulnerability of border Protestants

​The service to commemorate the Kingsmill massacre was held in Bessbrook last Sunday, but the actual anniversary was marked at the scene of the attack on Monday.

By Ben Lowry, Belfast News Letter, January 10th, 2026

​I was at the 11am short service, conducted by the Rev Graham Middleton and lasting around 15 minutes, 50 years to the day after the IRA atrocity.

It is a lonely rural part of south Armagh, with one of those twisting, undulating lanes that you find all over Ulster. In the near 20 years that I have been at this newspaper, we have reported many times on the 1976 killing of 10 Protestant workmen, but this was the first time that I had been to the precise place that it happened.

Three things struck me about the location, where there is now a memorial to the dead:

The first was the contrast between Monday morning and the time when the shootings took place: it was at the same point in the calendar, January 5, but this week’s roadside commemoration was held on a stunning wintry sunny day, with frost and light snow on the fields and the countryside at its most beautiful. The killings took place in the chilling pitch darkness of the early evening.

The second thing that struck me was that the site, on the Kingsmill Road between Glenanne and Bessbrook, was the perfect place to carry out such a heinous crime, undetected. It is so lightly populated that few people would hear anything, and the likelihood of a passing car was minimal. The minibus, carrying 11 Protestant and one Catholic workmen, was stopped by a men in combat uniform, wrongly thought to be army. Then 11 gunmen emerged from the hedges, in a highly calculated ambush.

The third thing that struck me was that the area seemed like a sample of those many border parts of Northern Ireland I have visited, in which Protestants are a small minority who were deeply vulnerable to IRA attackers who typically fled across the border. Even in 1976, Protestants were a tiny population in rural south Armagh, and those numbers have dropped further still, due to the success of such republican intimidation – literal terror, in that they made it too terrifying to live there.

On Monday, when there were perhaps 50 present for the service, I asked afterwards if there were any people who had lived right beside the scene. I found only two, probably because there are so few residents of any religion in the vicinity, and Protestants even less so.

Joey Cartmill, whose father Thomas was a first cousin of one of the men who was killed, Robert Freeburn, lived across fields to the south of the attack scene. He was 14 at the time, and remembers hearing it – “it is just like yesterday”.

Sounded like ‘hammering nails into tin’

“It was like someone hammering nails into a tin,” he told me. “Then it stopped and there was a second go again.”

Joey was left at home with a sibling while his parents left about half an hour later to find out more news.

Jennifer Jordan lived even closer to the scene, 300 metres to the northwest, near to Kingsmill Presbyterian church (while it has a church, Kingsmill is so small you could not even call it a hamlet). Then aged in her 20s, Jennifer heard nothing that night, but learned the following morning of the massacre.

"It was an isolated community. It was quite a horrific thing to have happened, because these 10 men were innocent men, and they weren’t in any security forces.”

This internet version of this article has the video of Joey and Jennifer speaking about their limited memories of that terrible night, half a century ago.

It is ironic that Ms Jordan mentions the fact that the massacre victims were not in the security forces, because her own father was murdered four years later, almost to the day – in January 1980 – at their home nearby. Samuel F Lundy had been in the UDR but, then aged 62, he was retired.

Three IRA men shot the lorry driver as he returned from work. The then Ulster Unionist MP Harold McCusker said the killing was part of a campaign to “intimidate or eradicate a small community”. The IRA said he should have let them know he had left the security forces.

We have long covered the way in which the legacy plans for Northern Ireland, which have exhaustively examined killings by the police and army, have no process for looking at the killings of hundreds of Protestants along the border, by republicans who fled into the Republic.

Downing Street defends military spending after warnings of £28bn black hole

By David Lynch and Helen Corbett, Press Association Political Correspondents, Belfast News Letter, January 10th, 2026

​Downing Street has defended the government's commitment to defence, after Sir Keir Starmer was warned by the country's top military chief of a £28 billion shortfall in the Ministry of Defence (MoD) budget.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton reportedly told the Prime Minister that an MoD assessment last year showed a £28 billion shortfall between now and 2030.

The Prime Minister's official spokesman said the Government has recognised that "demands on defence are rising" and acted accordingly.

The Chancellor and Defence Secretary were also at the meeting with the military chief in the run up to Christmas, as first reported by The Times and The Sun newspapers.

News of the MoD black hole is thought to have prompted Sir Keir to order an overhaul of the defence investment plan (Dip), which has been delayed after first being expected in the autumn.

The Dip will set out how the strategic defence review is to be delivered.

The Prime Minister's official spokesman would not comment directly on the meeting, but told reporters: "We recognise demands on defence are rising, with growing Russian aggression, increasing operational requirements and preparations for a Ukraine deployment.

"That is why the Government has acted. The UK defence budget is rising to record levels as this Government delivers the biggest boost to defence spending since the Cold War, totalling £270 billion in this Parliament alone."

The spokesman was asked repeatedly if the reported £28 billion shortfall was an official figure, and did not deny that it was.

Sir Richard took over as Chief of the Defence Staff in September and is responsible for the delivery of the strategic defence review, published in June, as the UK has pledged to boost defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2027.

Increased military budget ‘when economic conditions allow’

The review also set out a goal to raise spending to 3% in the next Parliament "when fiscal and economic conditions allow".

The news of a shortfall comes as the UK this week pledged to put troops on the ground in Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire, and after UK bases and military personnel supported a US operation to seize an oil tanker in the Atlantic, said to be part of a "shadow fleet" seeking to evade sanctions on Iranian oil.

Defence Secretary John Healey travelled to Ukraine on Friday, for a one-day visit to Kyiv which included a meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky .

Amid a fraught global political situation, the Prime Minister has also spoken to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron about Ukraine , Greenland and Iran.

A Downing Street spokeswoman said the leaders agreed Russia's use of an intermediate-range ballistic missile in western Ukraine on Friday was "escalatory and unacceptable".

Sir Keir told his counterparts it was "clear Russia was using fabricated allegations to justify the attack".

"Turning to the situation in Iran , the leaders agreed on the need for close co-ordination as events evolved and the Prime Minister reiterated his support for those who exercised their right to peaceful protest," the spokeswoman added.

The Prime Minister also said Nato "needed to step up" in the Arctic to "deter adversaries such as Russia ".

Sir Keir spoke to US President Donald Trump for the second time in as many days on Thursday, as they discussed the threat that an "increasingly aggressive" Russia poses in the "High North".

An MoD spokesperson said: "We are working flat out on the defence investment plan, which will fix the outdated, overcommitted, and underfunded defence programme we inherited."