The purpose of this site is to educate the public about the unfair and cruel treatment of Irish Republican POWs and to further provide information on how to encourage and support these prisoners. When researching the facts surrounding Irish POWs, I found very little information available. It is shocking how little is reported given the grave conditions of the prisons and the outrageous treatment of the POWs. Upon reading stories of medical neglect and human rights violations, it is hard to fathom how the public is not made aware of this travesty. Some examples of the human rights violations that the POWs encounter include, but is not limited to, the following: 22-23 hours a day cell lockdown for Republican prisoners; meals must be taken in cells within inches of open toilet; medical care only available one day per week; spoiled and rotten fruit served five times a week; lack of educational facilities (empty computer rooms for show only); classes offered to men include yoga and hairdressing (no valid education); families routinely refused visits by use of sniffer drugs dog despite prison’s own admission that drugs have never been found on republican prisoners or their families; families repeatedly fingerprinted on visits up to five times in one visit; frequent strip searches of up to a dozen times a day; frequent use of possibly radioactive x-ray metal detector leading to complaints of back pains; microphones and cameras throughout facilities including possibly in showers. Regardless of your political viewpoints regarding Irish Republicans, the facts remain:
There are at present 41 Irish Republicans incarcerated in British jails as a result of their activities in support of the Irish struggle for freedom and justice. In addition, there are a further 13 innocent people serving very long sentences after a series of frame-up trials designed to placate public opinion and give the impression that the British state is winning it’s war against the Irish people. Neither category of prisoner has received a fair or independent trial but is in fact being held as political hostages for the good behavior of the Irish people in Britain.
Every one of these prisoners, whether captured soldiers of the I.R.A. or innocent victims of a revenge hungry state, is in jail as a result of the war which exists between Britain and Ireland and there isn’t one of them who would have seen the inside of a prison cell but for this war. They are in reality, despite what the pro-British propagandists claim, political prisoners of war.
Of course, the British government denies that there are political prisoners in their jails because this is a vital part of their strategy to criminalize their opponents and legitimize their role in the Irish war. However, these men and women were arrested under special political rules, tried under special security conditions, given exceptionally long sentences served under special category A classification and have been refused by the Home Office the right, afforded to criminals, to serve their sentences in prisons near their families. All these factors infer that these men and women are not ordinary prisoners but special cases and this committee has set itself the task to campaign to gain these prisoners this recognition. (Adapted from the Irish Republican P.O.W Campaign (1983)