During the summer of 1996, following two gun attacks on the RUC by the Irish National Liberation Army in response to the Drumcree march, loyalist rioting, the intimidation of families from their homes, and the RUC curfew of the lower Ormeau, which served as an assault on the nationalist working class community, Irish Republican Socialist Ard Comhairle member Kevin McQuillen stated:

"The decision by the British goverment to capitulate to loyalists in Drumcree and on the Ormeau Road underscores the unchanging sectarian nature of British rule in the six counties."

Now, a year down the road, the INLA has been forced to again engage in "defensive and retaliatory action" against the occupation forces and to make plain its preparedness to act against the leaders within the loyalist community who have provoked yet another assault on the nationalist working class. The lesson learned 25 years ago on the streets of Derry on Bloody Sunday, and demonstrated again last year in Drumcree and the Ormeau Road, is again made plain for any who continue to harbor doubts regarding the unavoidable truth.

At this same time last year McQuillen asked:

"Given what has been witnessed, can the Irish Government or any nationalist party honestly call for moderation or say there can be accommodation with these people?"

Yet today, there are those within the Irish Government and the nationalist community who do precisely that once again.

How many times must this lesson be drawn in the blood of the nationalist working class before it is learned? How many times will we repeat the mistakes of the past?

The partition of Ireland into two artificial statelets is the continuing source of the social inequity, usurpation of sovereignty, divisions within the working class of Ireland which result in an inability of the vast majority of the people of that island to work effectively in their common interests, and recurrent violence that we see replayed at this time. The "carnival of reaction" anticipated by James Connolly were Ireland partitioned has been realized a thousand-fold.

Equality and social justice cannot be won so long as this division remains, and without equality and social justice, the only peace Ireland can know is the peace of the grave.

The British Government - the New Labour Government - stands once again exposed for its duplicity and treachery. No agreement can be reached with such an entitity, as its word is worth nothing. No agreement should be reached with the British Government, as they have no right to exercise restraint on the sovereignty of the Irish people. The only resolution to the problems of Ireland lies in the collective efforts of the whole of the people of Ireland, and no resolution can hope to address the concerns of the masses of Ireland's people that does not rest on a system capable of acting in the interests of those masses, the Irish working class.

Accordingly, the Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America, together with the whole of the Irish Republican Socialist Movement, call upon those who would seek justice, equality, and liberation in Ireland not to calm themselves, but rather to respond with anger and outrage befitting the continued debacle presented by British partition and occupation of Ireland. And, in doing so, to press forward until a 32-county Irish Workers' Republic has been won.