Group defends protest meeting

Describing themselves as a human rights organisation March for Justice Ireland hit out at a statement made in the press by Carla Lockhart, which described a planned protest in Lurgan organised by the group as “an attempt to glorify terrorism”.

The group said: “March for Justice Ireland is solely a human rights organisation, we endeavour to highlight issues affecting the people of Ireland, to date we have held three massively successful marches in Dublin and Limerick with another planned this coming weekend in Galway, we have highlighted issues such as homelessness, evictions, mental health, suicide, internment and more. We have supported many groups and protests as they too bring focus to issues affecting Ireland.

“This attack on a human rights organisation by Carla Lockhart is beyond contempt.

“The accusation that holding our protest less than two miles from the scene of the murder of Constable Carroll is a ‘deliberate attempt to glorify terrorism’ and an insult to the slain officer’s loved ones is nothing short of insulting.

“Must we remind Mrs Lockhart that the Craigavon Two both hail from Craigavon and anyone wishing to highlight the injustice of their conviction is entitled to do so in their own hometown.

“Let us be very clear our protest is in no way a deliberate attempt to glorify terrorism, we are merely highlighting an issue we firmly believe is an injustice to two innocent men.

“The family of Constable Carroll has our sympathy for the loss of their loved one, as do the families of two innocent men who have spent nearly eleven years in prison for a crime they did not commit.”

However, the widow of Constable Carroll, Kate, had also previously hit out at the planned protest - to take place in Lurgan town centre on March 28 - and had described it as an “attempt to reopen old wounds”.

Organisers had also been criticised for using the war memorial in Lurgan as an assembly point with the protest to take place a short distance away - at two landmark statues in the town centre.

March for Justice Ireland said: “Our choice of meeting point in Lurgan is not to ‘hurt and insult’ as Carla Lockhart claims. The location to meet is for the convenience of those travelling from all over the country as it is a central location, not the sinister plan Mrs Lockhart is trying to lead the public to believe.

“We are a human rights organization and as stated we have organised this event to highlight an injustice, Carla Lockhart`s attempt to discredit us and label our organisation as anything other than what we are is a ploy of the DUP and the press that is to be expected as it is following a trend established decades ago, of vilifying those who stand against injustice wrought upon Irish men and women who have been wrongly convicted of crimes by the British state, cases in point are the Guildford Four, the Maguire Seven, and the Birmingham Six!”

Constable Carroll was murdered by the Continuity IRA in a gun attack at Lismore Manor in Craigavon, as he answered a 999 call on March 9, 2009.

Two men were convicted of his murder - former Sinn Fein Councillor Brendan McConville and John Paul Wootton - and an appeal of those conviction was dismissed in 2014.