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These documents were scanned, collated and catalogued by Ruth Murray, Annabel Harris, Isha Pareek, Eleanor Williams, Antoine Yenk, Harriet Carter, Oliver Nicholls, Kieran Wetherwick, and Cerys Griffiths.
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RJA/423/91/SH
FROM: R J ALSTON
US (POL)
6 March 1991
cc PS/PUS (L&B) - B
Mr Thomas – B
Mr McNeill – B
Mr Petch – B
MR PILLING – B
FATHER RAYMOND MURRAY
In the course of a PAB organised visit to Armagh yesterday I spent some 45 minutes with Father Raymond Murray. In the course of this he made some comments on the Provisional movement which reflected a somewhat different historical perspective from most other commentators and may be worth recording.
He said that in his view Gerry Adams had been at his strongest, and had had the best chance to politicise at the Provisional movement, in the years between the end of the hunger strike and the Enniskillen bombing. That event, and a number of other subsequent events, such as the broadcast ban, had sufficiently weakened his position vis a vis “the militants”. He and Father Reid had worked quite hard up to a year or so ago to encourage the Provisionals to develop a new approach based on a broad nationalist coalition with the SDLP and the Irish. However Mr Haughey’s weakened internal position had made it harder for him to pursue this path. Although he believes that contact between the SDLP and Sinn Fein had not entirely stopped, and the priests efforts could be picked up again, he was relatively gloomy about the prospect of making further headway in this direction. He added that it was extremely difficult to know precisely what the Provisional movement wanted to achieve, which might in turn reflect the dividing nature of the internal debate.
I commented that the present Secretary of State had made a number of comments which John Hume at least regarded as highly positive in this context (which he acknowledged) and said that he had himself reinforced with people in “the Movement”) and that it was impossible for any Secretary of State to move further or envisage an instant place for Sinn Fein in the political process whilst violence continued with episodes like the Downing Street attack. (This he acknowledged without substantive comment).
Comment
[signed]
R J ALSTON
Ext 2507
27 1988 - 2023
38 1993 - 1993
55 101 - 1991
64 1993 - 2020
26 1993 - 1993
57 1993 - 1993
59 1993 - 1993
51 1993 - 1993
18 1993 - 1993
24 1993 - 1994
41 1993 - 1994
32 1993 - 1994
72 101 - 1994
8 101 - 1990
76 101 - 1994
1 1994
60 101 - 1994
65 1993 - 2023
37 101 - 1993
54 101 - 1993
32 101 - 1993
77 1993 - 1993
58 101 - 2018
49 1993 - 1997
61 101 - 1992
38 101 - 1991
48 1992 - 1993
134 101 - ?-??
59 101 - 2023
84 101 - 1993
64 101 - 1991
44
11
31 1996 - 1996
61 1996 - 1996
49 1996 - 1996
20 1996 - 1997
32 1996 - 1996
48 1996 - 1996
74 1996 - None
4 1996 - 1996
33 1996 - 1996
30 1996 - 1996
7 1996 - 1996
24 1996 - 1996
9 1996 - 1996
59 1996 - 1996
60 1996 - 1996
14 1996 - 1997
41 1996 - 1996
45 1996 - 1996
67 1996 - 1996
16 1996 - 1996
87 1996 - None
23 1996 - 1996
79 1996 - None
22 1996 - 1996
1991-03-06
This memo, sent by Robert Alston, provides an account of a meeting between Robert Alston and Father Raymond Murray on 5 March 1991. Alston recorded Murray's unique historical perspective on PIRA, particularly on Gerry Adams's attempts to integrate PIRA into the constitutional political processes. The document is annotated and marked, with a long pencil line across the page.
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Unless otherwise specified, this material falls under Crown Copyright and contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
The National Archives of the UK (TNA), digitzed by the Quill Project at https://quillproject.net/resource_collections/351/.