Violence On The Fringe

By Barry Hillenbrand/London

Edward Treanor, a 31-year-old civil servant, was enjoying a New Year's Eve drink with his new girlfriend at her pub, the Clifton Tavern in Catholic North Belfast. At 9:07 p.m. two masked men, one armed with a submachine gun, the other with a pistol, burst in and began firing indiscriminately at the customers. Treanor was hit in the head and died before he could greet the new year--a new year that starts off with an ill omen for peace in Northern Ireland.

Catholics in the province had been bracing for attacks ever since the Dec. 27 murder of Billy Wright, leader of the Loyalist Volunteer Force (L.V.F.), a fringe paramilitary group that is staunchly opposed to the interparty peace talks under way in Belfast. Wright, a hotheaded, macho killer, was gunned down in a daring execution-style murder inside the Maze prison by members of the Irish National Liberation Army, a violent Catholic splinter organization that is also strongly opposed to the talks, and has never agreed to join the cease-fire agreed to by the I.R.A.

The outbreak of violence between these two extremes of the sectarian struggle comes at an importune--and nervous--time. The Protestant unionist parties participating in the talks were already discontent with the way British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Marjorie Mowlam was handling the negotiations. Says M.P. Ken Maginnis, a senior member of the Ulster Unionist Party: "She has been giving concession after concession to Sinn Fein and the I.R.A., while frustrating our interests time and time again. This can only lead to tears." Maginnis demanded Mowlam's resignation, and some unionists in his party are threatening to pull out of the talks altogether. Mowlam held a stormy meeting with U.U.P. leaders on New Year's Eve, only hours before Treanor was murdered, but she failed to mollify the unionists.

No one expected that the peace process would extinguish all the violence in the North. The test is whether killings like the ones last week are seen as political events or as mere criminal acts. If the established paramilitary groups on either side join in the violence, then the extremists will have succeeded in derailing any progress toward reconciliation.

After Treanor's murder, rumors flew around Belfast that one of the mainstream Protestant paramilitary groups may have provided assistance to the L.V.F. in pulling off its New Year's Eve hit. But leaders of the parties with close links to the Protestant gunmen claim the L.V.F. is acting on its own. As annoyed with Mowlam as they are, these leaders want to isolate the extremists.

So far the I.R.A. seems determined to keep its ample supply of guns and explosives locked away, and stick with the talks. "These marginal, fringe groups will not subvert the peace process," says a top aide to Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein, the political wing of the I.R.A.

Tension is still running high in the province. In a statement claiming responsibility for the murder of Treanor, the L.V.F. warned, "This is not the end." And the hard men from the Irish National Liberation Army sprayed a Protestant home in rural Newtonbutler with gunfire on New Year's Day. But if the leaders of the mainstream republican and unionist parties continue to stay calm, then 1998 for Northern Ireland might just end up brighter than it began.

--By Barry Hillenbrand/London. With reporting by Paul Connolly/Belfast

With reporting by PAUL CONNOLLY/BELFAST