THE IRISH OBSERVER: Martin McCauley, RUC Murders

Sunday, November 1, 2020

Martin McCauley, RUC Murders

A member of the SF/PIRA Colombia Three is under investigation over an IRA landmine attack in which three RUC Officers were Murdered. Martin McCauley, who is from Lurgan but lives in The Irish Republic, is the focus of a new probe into the 1982 Murders.

Background

Sinn Fein/PIRA agreed to provide terrorist training to many international terrorist organisations since the formation of Sinn Fein/PIRA in 1969-70. This training was normally provided in exchange for weapons, ammunition and explosives.

However, the relationship between Sinn Fein/PIRA and Farc Narco-terrorists in Columbia would be very different. Sinn Fein/PIRA would be paid in drug money, Cocaine has long since been the currency of Farc, and in exchange for training Farc terrorists in various bomb and mortar making skills, Sinn Fein/PIRA would be paid from the cash generated by drugs smuggled into Ireland.

Sinn Fein/PIRA have a long and sordid relationship with the drugs trade. In this relationship with Farc, Sinn Fein/PIRA would assist, a relatively unknown Irish drug gang at the time of the Columbian 3 arrests, The Kinahan Gang, now referred to as The Kinahan Cartel, who are in a feud with the much smaller Hutch Gang.

Sinn Fein/PIRA would assist The Kinahan Cartel with the logistics of getting drugs into Ireland. The drugs would be sold by Kinahan’s network of dealers, the money would be laundered in front businesses belonging to The Kinahan’s and other premises belonging to Sinn Fein/PIRA, the latter mainly based in Dublin inner city.

Sinn Fein/PIRA in Columbia

At least 7 members of Sinn Fein/PIRA travelled to Columbia at various stages since the signing of The Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

The three who would become known as The Columbia 3, would be seasoned bomb maker, James Monaghan, James Monaghan was arrested with Niall Connolly and Martin McCauley in Colombia in August 2001 on charges of providing explosives training to FARC members. Connolly could speak fluent Spanish and was seen as an important asset.

FARC is the Spanish acronym for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the Marxist rebel group attempting to overthrow the country’s government since the 1960s.

NOTE: James Monaghan’s son, Donal O Coisdealbha (24), of Abbeyfield, Killester, Dublin 5, was charged with IRA membership and with possessing a timer power unit (TPU) at Profector Life Sciences based at Maynooth University. He was also charged with membership of an illegal organisation. This related to a plan to carryout a bomb attack on Prince Charles in 2015, when Prince Charles visited Ireland.

After a protracted trial, the men were found guilty in April 2004 of travelling on false passports but acquitted of the bomb-training charges.

However, the prosecution successfully appealed the latter decision and, in December that same year, the men were sentenced to 17 years in prison.

By then, however, the trio had jumped bail and fled Colombia. They resurfaced in Ireland in late 2005 and there have been no moves since to extradite them.

James Monaghan, while On-The-Run, from Columbian authorities, spoke at the Sinn Féin Ard Fheis and assisted in Sinn Fein/PIRA’s general election campaign.

“To the world media, this was a story of major importance in terms of global issues of terrorism, intimately involving British and US intelligence, the Colombian government, the massive Colombian drugs industry, the US State Department, and the ‘peace process’ in Ireland.”