Standoff at historical N Ireland flashpoint

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1:39Hello and welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service live from London. This is Owen Bennett-Jones and just as we come on air there is a developing story here in Britain where police have declared a major incident near an airbase in England. The base is used by the US Air Force as well. I'm just seeing on the monitors in the studio here that they're saying there will be an update from the police soon and we will be bringing you the latest on that as soon as we get it. There are very few details at the moment. But we're starting in Northern Ireland where history is never far away. It's the part of the UK where the Catholic population largely favours joining Ireland and most Protestants want to stay with Britain.

2:20And for three decades from the late 60s, that led to the Troubles, as they were called, a civil conflict in which thousands died. And one of the points of tension during the Troubles were marches or parades, a tradition whereby people, often from the Protestant community, marched through largely Catholic streets. And one place in particular became associated with this, the Garvacky Road in Porter Down. This is how the BBC's Kate Adie reported on the parade there back in 1996. At one o 'clock in Gavachi Road, there was a wall of armoured vehicles, a double line of police in riot gear and a sullen crowd from the housing estate as the sound of a single drumbeat heralded the loyalist parade.

3:06From the alleys came some petrol bombs, then stones and bottles and bricks. The police replied immediately and repeatedly with plastic bullets. Well, as clear from that, these marches were so contentious, they did often lead to violence and threaten the peace process in the 90s. So a commission was set up to manage the marches. And after a court case just now, this commission, it's called the Parades Commission, is allowing a Protestant march to go ahead today on the Garvaki Road. That's the first time in almost 30 years. and the British Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, appealed for calm. The job that I have, that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has, is upholding the Good Friday Agreement, and I take that responsibility really seriously.

3:51It's also the responsibility of the Taoiseach in the Republic of Ireland, and I spoke to him yesterday because we work very closely together on all of these matters. Now, I know it's a tense situation. We do appeal for calm on all sides. there have been big gains made in Northern Ireland and we don't want to see things go backwards. Well, right now there is a standoff on the road, heavy rain too, and that's all on the BBC Live page for images. You can go there. So let's just get an insight now into why these marches happen in the first place. They seem likely to cause trouble, so why do them? Journalist Susan McKay has written a couple of books that deal with the Protestant community in Northern Ireland, Northern Protestants on Shifting Ground, and another one, Northern Protestants and Unsettled People.

4:39And before we get into the interview, it's worth me saying that these marches are often organised by so-called orange lodges, and the Protestant marches are sometimes called orangemen. So, what's behind the court decision and the parade commission therefore saying yes to a march? It is extremely hard to understand why this decision was taken. I think the reason why it means a lot to unionists at the moment is because once again they are worried. They saw the peace process back in the 1990s as being threatening to unionism and threatening to the Northern state. And at the moment, the institutions that were set up under the Good Friday Agreement are not doing well.

5:21There's a sort of stasis in government in the north of Ireland and increasingly nationalists and quite a growing number of Protestants, unionists, people of a unionist background, have started talking about how it might be better to have a united Ireland. And that conversation has become more persuasive among a lot of people, including Protestant people, because of Brexit, which has made the division of Ireland much more visible again, which the peace process had kind of assuaged. The border is now visible again because of Brexit. And a lot of people are saying, you know, maybe it might be worthwhile just looking at reunification of Ireland.

6:00and that is profoundly threatening to traditional unionists and that is why something like Orange Order marches being allowed to go wherever they want to go becomes important again. It should be said that there is a lot of disingenuousness in a way because there are other routes that they could take and the nationalist community naturally thinks, well, why do they want to walk down our road? Is it not just a traditional way of saying we're in charge here? Give us your characterisation of what's happening today and why it matters. What's happening at the moment, I think, is a visual embodiment of tensions that have been building for some time, where unionists are feeling increasingly threatened by the prospect that there could be a border pole, which might lead to the ultimate unification of Ireland, which is what nationalists want.

6:55and also a feeling among the nationalist community that unionism wants to dominate them again. So it's a very difficult situation for everybody because the protest that the nationalist and republican community is putting up on the Garvachie Road means that they are going against a legal ruling. Unionists have always opposed the Parades Commission. Now nationalists are also opposing it, which means that the Parades Commission effectively is useless in terms of taking the sting out of these contentious parades. So it's now hard to see what's going to happen if other people want to have parades like this or have other kinds of parades.

7:37It does seem as if it's forcing a kind of confrontational politics which many people had hoped had been left behind. It's worth saying as well that there's been a lot of very vitriolic exchanges with the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party and other members of unionism saying extremely harsh things about nationalists and about the leaders of Sinn Féin, the Republican Party, which is in government with the Democratic Unionist Party and vice versa. People are trading insults at this stage who are supposed to be in government together and who are supposed to be agreeing a budget for Northern Ireland, the north of Ireland for the coming year.

8:19Things are not good economically in the north of Ireland. Brexit has been very damaging. The government is having difficulties and this is definitely not going to help. It's very hard to see how Michelle O 'Neill, the leader of Sinn Féin, who is on the Garvachie Road, and Emma Little Pengelly, the head of the DUP, how they're going to work together easily after the sorts of things that are being said at the moment. And that was the journalist and author Susan McKay. Well, Carla Lockhart is the Member of Parliament for this part of the UK. She's with the largely Protestant-backed Democratic Unionist Party.

8:55She says the law is on the side of the marchers. You will have seen the 35 men. That's what they're afraid of. 35 men walking peacefully down a road with no band, silently, with a collarette. Now what does that say when you have an absolute rabble down there with thousands chanting and our first minister for all, our self-proclaimed first minister for all, leading the chants and standing unlawfully? Well, I'm joined now by Claire Hanna, Belfast MP and leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, SDLP, which enjoys predominantly Catholic support and favours achieving a united Ireland through peaceful political means.

9:41And well, Claire Hanna, you heard the Protestant representative, Democratic Unionist Party representative there saying, look, this is just 35 people walking down a road, no banners, no music, which is what's been allowed. What's the problem with that? Well, I think your last contributor, Susan McKay, said it out quite well. It's also worth adding that hundreds and indeed thousands of parades go completely unrestricted across Northern Ireland every year. So it really isn't a case of people not being accommodated. And indeed, the glib assertions that it's just 35 men going back from church, even leaving aside the fact that there are many, many roads in Portadown that could be travelled.

10:24It is seen widely, including by people in the centre ground, as an act of domination, an act of asserting, an act of deliberately polarising people. And I suppose trying to take people back into the tribal trenches of the 1990s just because of a failure to get to grips with the modern world and politics. and Susan was also right to say that neither the DUP or Sinn Féin are doing particularly well at the basics of government and just delivering public services and both of them are in their comfort zone in this type of division and polarisation. Do you understand why the decision was taken? Because I think elsewhere in the UK many people will think that this problem had largely been solved.

11:11As you say, marches go on in locations where it's no problem. and you know why is it happening? Yeah that has been a real mess it's worth I mean I think the predominant view is why on earth would we reopen this wound why on earth are people being dragged into an argument that most people feel was settled decades ago I won't bore you too much with the detail but there was a procedural bungle by the Parades Commission a couple of months ago where effectively they were lax decision making. They sort of applied just sort of cut and paste on the decision. And then there's been this massive overcorrection.

11:51And I'm not sure, I mean, they have, there was a day, I was in the High Court all day yesterday, seven hours of grinding hearings and negotiations. And quite clearly there are massive holes in how the Parades Commission arrived at their decision. And indeed, there are questions for the police about the assessments that they did or didn't give of the ramifications either way. So, you know, I'm somebody and as social democrats, we seek to uphold the law. But I have to say this is not politically or morally right. The decision to allow the parade was stayed yesterday evening at half seven. And the residents thought, OK, that's not happening and they could relax.

12:35But at 11.30, an even more bizarre twist in the weekend at 11.30 again, the parade was back on last night. So it has been a very, very turbulent weekend. We're in a very difficult situation in terms of a standoff. And it needs to be broken by the UK government, who do have the power in conjunction with the police to say, look, this has to be broken. The permission should be rescinded and the parties can go back to the table. but it gets people off the streets and gets us a space to de-escalate and find a way forward. Can I go back to what our analyst was saying earlier, Susan McKay, that basically this reflects Protestant fears that a united Ireland is getting closer.

13:19You know, we can get away from the events of the day, the late night court hearings and all that. That is the basic problem, isn't it? And it's real. I think she's right. I think she is right. There is a sense of, I suppose, being cornered, failing to, I suppose, engage with the conversation on constitutional change. But part of the reason it is being and has accelerated is one, due to the catastrophic decision making of unionism during Brexit. You know, forcing, trying to force a hard Brexit on a population that had rejected it and then making a series of strategic errors in how they managed that.

13:57So many people are questioning the ability of unionist political leaders. And I suppose they are at their most comfortable if they whip up those fears and those tensions. The status quo doesn't work. I mean, we are a party who does seek a New Ireland by consent. And that's in large part because the status quo simply isn't working. Politics is characterised by the two large parties as about confrontation and polarisation. OK, there we are. That was Claire Hanna at Belfast MP, leader of the SDLP in Northern Ireland.

14:37...to the World Service of the BBC and coming up, a tribute to the late film director David Lynch from the musician and actor Alicia Witt. I felt as soon as I met David that I had met the most extraordinary person. it's because of who he was as a human being the empathy that he had the insistent optimism and some headlines british police have declared a major incident near an air base in england used by the united states air force a number of people have been arrested on explosive charges we're going to bring you the very latest on that in just a few moments and nearly 30 people have been killed in two mass shootings in south africa and the pope has urged french bishops to keep up the battle against sex abuse by the clergy.

15:36You're listening to News Hour. I'm just looking at the TV monitors in the studio, which for 20 minutes have been saying, soon, police update after RAF base incident. So that hasn't happened yet. We'll bring you that the moment it does, if we can. But this is a major incident declared in Britain around this Royal Air Force base that hosts a permanent US contingent too. Several men arrested on suspicion of explosives offences. Here's a local resident describing what happened. I heard shouting outside our front door. I don't know where it was from, and then looked out the window and saw people being held by the police outside the house.

16:13Bits are real, but you get used to funny things going on sometimes around the base. Well, I'm joined by our diplomatic correspondent, James Landale, who's been trying to follow this, It's rather difficult to do because, I mean, it's been going on a few hours this and there are amazingly few details. Yeah. All we know so far is that several men have been detained, as you say, under the Explosive Act, according to the police. We know that three white vans have been observed being investigated by bomb disposal units with their remotely operated equipment. uh as you say a major incident declared by the the police uh you know a number of local residents evacuated for safety reasons one assumes uh but yes at the moment uh we don't know who we don't know why and we don't know precisely how um but clearly you know vehicles the suspicion is vehicles were involved um and explosives but we don't know precisely you know where they originated what purpose you don't have to go far online to get the you know in the in the vacuum left by the lack of official statements uh you know there's lots of speculation and basically comes down to iran or russia yeah and and i think the moment the money seems to be on iran and it's not hard to join the dots this is a an airbase uh that is used it's uh to buy american bombers to attack iran it's the you know the biggest most substantial airbase that the united states air force has access to in Europe for its biggest, heaviest, longest range bombers.

17:46It has had that capacity since the Cold War, been there for a long, long time. And since early March has been used to attack Iranian targets. When that began, it was politically controversial. And the Iranian Foreign Ministry put out a very formal statement saying, and I quote, any party that in any manner participates in military aggression against Iran will bear responsibility for the consequences and repercussions of its decision. And that was widely interpreted as an Iranian threat that bases like Fairford were legitimate targets. I think it's worth saying there has been a significant increase, isn't there, in governments hiring local people, often quite sort of flaky local people, to mount pretty serious attacks.

18:35I mean, not on this scale, to be honest, but but nonetheless, sometimes murderous attacks. Correct. The use of proxies is a common tool by Russia, by Iran, by other states, by bribery, other forms of inducements to get individuals, perhaps those vulnerable, perhaps those criminal, to carry out acts on their behalf. And that is something that can't be ruled out in this circumstance. But I think you're right that an attack of this scale, involving a number of people, involving several vehicles, as far as we know, suggests it's at, you know, this is not just a single individual leaving a bag with an explosive against a door that we've seen in previous incidents.

19:23Yeah, because, you know, explosives, obviously you can make them at home, but nonetheless, in the UK generally, they're not easily available. I mean, that's not an easy thing to do. Yeah, and therefore that requires some, the suspicion is there'll be some form of network. I think the fact that vehicles have been discovered, individuals have been detained, suggests that there's a reasonable chance that at some point the authorities will find out who was behind this and who was paying these or where they're from. We will find out. Thank you very much. James Landale. They are listening to the World Service of the BBC.

20:02The traditional narrative of the triumphant British-organised 1953 Everest expedition is being challenged by a new film, Tenzing, which premiered in Zurich this week. It puts the focus not on the British, but on the Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norge, who climbed Everest alongside the New Zealander Edmund Hillary. The picture will open, the Zurich Film Festival, but it's already had outings at other film festivals, and Tom Brook reports. The Toronto Film Festival, one of the stops for the historical drama Tenzing, which is being shown at several major festivals in the run-up to its release next month.

20:44This is Tenzing, the man we've all been waiting for. The film tells of the triumphant 1953 British Mount Everest expedition, in which New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first men to reach the peak of Everest. Tenzing! In Britain, news of the feat came through on the eve of Coronation Day in 1953 and it was perceived as a great British achievement. Perhaps we should join forces. In the film, Tom Hiddleston portrays Edmund Hillary and Tibetan actor Jindim Penso plays Tenzing. The cast has been promoting this picture, along with Australian director Jennifer Peadum, who, with the film, is making her first narrative feature.

21:30In this film, the story of the British Everest expedition puts the emphasis on Sherpa Tenzing Norgay. I wanted to tell a different side of the story. You know, Tenzing Norgay was, you know, one of the people that helped achieve that feat for the British, and he'd always been a supporting character. He'd always been with his Sherpa guide, Tenzing Norgay, as opposed to the hero of that narrative. It just felt to me time to redress that balance or just to look at that story from a different point of view and what it meant for him. I am on the climbing team. The movie conveys the difference in approach between how British members of the expedition viewed Everest as a mountain to be conquered, whereas Tenzing and the Himalayan Sherpa community revered Everest as sacred, the abode of a goddess.

22:18It's like a different paradigm for those people in that community. Those mountains and those landscapes are the living embodiment of their gods. For Westerners, it's something quite different. It's a symbol of achievement. And so showing the difference in approach, I mean, there's various scenes in the film that the Sherpas describe the mountains as the bones and them as the blood. it's a different relationship to landscape that we possibly don't understand and this was an opportunity to explore that idea. Tenzing had its Canadian premiere here at the Toronto International Film Festival and it took place less than a month after the huge devastation wrought by landslides and flash floods in the Nepal-Tibet region not far from where this Mount Everest epic was set But it is seen as providing audiences with a positive and respectful portrait of not just Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary, but also the local population who live in the region.

23:22One of the film's producers, Ian Canning, acknowledges the film is landing in the wake of a tragedy. I think the film can play, I hope, some part in bringing that part of the world's culture to the screen and to audiences all around the world. and I think hopefully some sort of feeling of how turbulent and unpredictable the environment and landscape can be and I think that Tenzing in a small way also tells that story. The film's cinematography is striking. The mountain climbing sequences shot in Nepal and New Zealand come across as authentic. And so does the story of the self-spoken Tenzing, a man who contributed mightily to what was perceived as a great British triumph, but who may, through this film, get people to understand his perspective and view mountains and Mother Nature in a rather different way.

24:19So, credit to Tenzing Nga in that film called Tenzing. That was Tom Brook reporting.

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25:20This was someone I respected above anyone else. And the investigation led by students he's trying to silence. If this is leaked to the media, I'll be destroyed. This is World of Secrets, catching my teacher. Listen on BBC.com, the BBC app, or wherever you get your BBC podcasts.

26:01unfairly. But how did the allegations against Manchester City emerge in the first place? As Laura Scott reports, it was because of a computer hacker in Portugal. The Lisbon Court of Appeal has upheld Rui Pinto's four-year suspended prison. Rui Pinto confess. The WikiLeaks activist reopened. He's the cherubic-looking convicted computer hacker who for a decade has brought chaos to the world of football, including Manchester City. And yet even the most avid fans don't know his name. I travelled around Europe to find out more about this mysterious figure. In Porto, we met Mario Falcao, who taught in geography at school and was also his form teacher.

26:44Rui Pinto was a normal pupil. He was nice with his spiky hair. He was quite sociable, but not extrovert. Perfectly normal pupil, who had a good relationship with the teachers, although he did miss these classes quite often. He was very good in computers. All the work that he did for various courses were very good when he put his mind to it. Rui Pinto moved to Budapest and in 2015 set up the Football Leaks website, which sought to show the hidden side of football. He then agreed to share tens of millions of documents with a journalist at the German magazine De Spiegel, leading to some of the most explosive articles football has ever seen.

27:26It was very much a fascinating feeling of like a child in a candy store. Christoph Winterbach was part of the team of journalists in Hamburg who worked on the material provided by Pinto. It was amazing to see the actual documents, to see those emails where things are negotiated and to get a real look behind the curtain how things work. Rui Pinto absolutely is a whistleblower. He's one of the most important whistleblowers that we have in Europe or maybe the world. Pinto ultimately provided more than three terabytes of information to the European Investigative Collaborations Consortium and has threatened to release more.

28:01But it's brought serious consequences for him personally, facing several court cases, including one brought by sports bodies such as Benfica, which was dismissed on the basis he'd already been convicted over similar charges in 2023. Our argument is very, very simple. He's an hacker, period. For some, like Rui Patricio, the lawyer representing Benfica, one of the clubs that had information leaked by Pinto, he is a criminal hacker. What he did is not a love, it's a crime and there are no excuses. To others, like the Portuguese politician Ana Gomez, he's a heroic whistleblower who shone a light on the darker side of the beautiful game.

28:43He should be made an ally of our judicial and criminal investigative authorities. What would you say then to Manchester City, who have had their emails hacked by Rui Pinto? Couldn't care less. Their problem, if they have nothing to hide, what's their problem? And that report from Laura Scott.