AS TRIBUTES pour in from across the world for former US President Jimmy Carter, who recently celebrated his 100th birthday, a Fermanagh priest has recalled how the Nobel Peace Prize winner had “wanted to do the right thing” regarding the North.
Fr Sean McManus, who originally hails from Kinawley and is the brother of former MP Frank McManus, is the president and founder of the powerful Washington-based political lobby group the Irish National Caucus.
Responding to an article by journalist and founder of the Irish Central website, Niall O’Dowd, Fr McManus said, “God bless former President Jimmy Carter.
“He wanted to do the right thing regarding Northern Ireland. It was bad enough Carter had to deal with the awful Maggie Thatcher, as this article explains. However, even worse, the dreadful Garett Fitzgerald did all in his power to oppose Carter’s desire to help.”
Fr McManus noted the Irish Central article, which focussed on how President Carter clashed with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on a US ban on arms shipments to the RUC, “makes important reading.”
In the article, Mr O’Dowd outlines how it was lobbying from Fr McManus and the Irish National Caucus that originally led to the ban in 1979.
It was a move by the US government that Prime Minister Thatcher reportedly felt strained the allies’ ‘special relationship.’
The British Government had ordered thousands of arms, such as Magnum handguns and semiautomatic rifles, from a corporation in Connecticut, however the US government decided to withhold export licences for the shipment to the RUC.
Prime Minister Thatcher even travelled to Washington to push for a reversal of the decision, reportedly “schooling the US president on the conflict.” She also sent four papers to the US detailing UK policy.
Examining reports, minutes and previously sealed documents from the time, the article noted President Carter, in response to Prime Minister Thatcher’s request, had asked US Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill to reverse the ban.
However Speaker O’Neill, whose both parents hailed from Inishowen in Co Donegal, refused.
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