Hunger strikes come back to haunt Sinn Féin

The front page of The Irish News has caused consternation in Ireland north and south, with revelations that Sinn Féin, formerly the political wing of the now defunct IRA, vetoed a deal with the British government during the 1981 hunger strikes during which 10 republican prisoners died. According to Garret FitzGerald, Taoiseach of the Irish Republic at the time, “the lives of six of the ten hunger strikers could have been saved in a deal which was acceptable to the prisoners.” The hunger strikers – generally IRA refused food in an attempt to regain special status as political prisoners which the British government of Margaret Thatcher had withdrawn. The Belfast daily reports that republican movement is bitterly divided on the question as to whether Sinn Féin unnecessarily prolonged the strikes in order to fuel international outrage. “The strike resulted in not only the deaths the prisoners,” the daily notes, “but led to serious street violence which caused dozens of deaths.”