Irish Republican National Congress (Fb | web) board in Northumberland Street. This one features assault rifles and some nasty barbed wire; the one in Beechmount featured a Maid Of Erin harp.
With a small “Support the Palestinians” tarp below.
Visca Catalunya Lliure – Ireland stands with Catalonia” – tarp above the newsagents at the junction of Springfield Drive and Springfield Road, west Belfast.
The IRA’s Sean Savage, Maıréad Farrell, and Dan McCann were “Executed by the British SAS 6th March 1988.”
“Oh! Cold March winds that pierce the dark/You cry in aged tones/For souls of folk you’ve brought to God/But still you bear the moans//Oh! Weeping winds, this lonely night/My mother’s heart is sore/Oh! Lord of all, breathe freedom’s breath/That she may weep no more! – Bobby Sands Weeping Winds“
The UDA’s Michael Stone killed three mourners at the funerals of the Gibraltar 3 in Milltown Cemetery in 1988 (16th March). UDA commanders denied that member Michael Stone was acting with their knowledge or approval. This east Belfast mural perhaps is a celebration of his release, under the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, on July 24th, 2000. “His only crime was loyalty.”
The panel on the right reads, “The cold grey mists shall never set on Ulster’s fields/The Victor’s cup shall not be raised unless we yield/Our fighting men shall not retreat or bend the knee/Untill [sic] the day imprisoned souls are all set free.”
“Loyalist martyr King Rat 1960-1997”. Billy Wright broke with the UVF over the ceasefire in 1994 and after being expelled (and the Mid-Ulster brigade disbanded) in the summer of 1996, formed the LVF (WP). Wright was killed in the Maze in December 1987 by members of the INLA (neither the INLA or LVF were on ceasefire). Johnny Adair of the UDA’s west Belfast C company was an admirer and supported of Wright and this is one of the murals he had painted in the lower Shankill estate.
A large green ribbon is added to Free Derry Corner (Visual History) as a call for prioritising the release of political prisoners in negotiations that take place during the ceasefire.