pax

Today there was a march in Belfast for not raising university fees, and for peace in Northern Ireland. In case you haven’t heard what’s been going on:

‘In God’s name, stop now’: Plea for peace as figures from all sides turn out for murdered PC’s funeral in Omagh

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 5:52 PM on 6th April 2011

An extraordinary show of unity was mounted at the funeral of murdered Irish policeman Ronan Kerr today.

Images that would have been unimaginable during the Troubles were seen at the moving ceremony in Beragh, County Tyrone.

In a major departure, First Minister Peter Robinson became the first Democratic Unionist Party leader to attend a Catholic mass.

And he stood alongside Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness at the ceremony.

The head of the Catholic church in Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady, called for an end to the futility and evil of violence during the service.

He said the people rejected those blamed for killing the new recruit and pleaded with parents not to allow their children to become violent.

Police Service of Northern Ireland officers and senior Gaelic Athletic Association members stood side by side to help carry Pc Kerr’s coffin.

He was killed when a booby trap device exploded under his Ford Mondeo at his Omagh home, near Beragh, as he got in to go to work.

His funeral at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Beragh, Co Tyrone, came as police revealed they had arrested a suspect.

The arrest of a 26-year-old, in Renton, Dumbartonshire in Scotland, came after officers seized a ‘significant’ haul of arms.

The arsenal found in Coalisland, east Tyrone, included Kalashnikov rifles, rocket launcher components and possibly Semtex explosive.

Assistant Chief Constable Drew Harris described the haul, found in stolen cars at a garage, as the ‘most significant in recent years’.

Back in Beragh, the small village ground to a halt as local schoolchildren and members of the officer’s boyhood Gaelic football club flanked the cortege led by his mother Nuala, who days ago appealed that his loss not be in vain.

A police hat and gloves were poignantly placed on top of the coffin.

Cardinal Brady told mourners: ‘The people have said no, never again, to the evil and futility of violence. They have said an emphatic no to the murder and mayhem of the past. Let there be no doubt that the killing of Ronan Kerr was totally unjustified.

‘It was an evil deed, an offence against God and a complete rejection of the belief that human life is sacred.’

His killing, blamed on dissident republicans opposed to the peace process, has sparked unanimous cross-community condemnation.

He added: ‘Parents and grandparents, I beg you, plead with your children and with your grandchildren not to get involved with violence.

‘Never let them be deceived by those who say that Ireland will be united or the union made more secure by war. They are wrong. It is an illusion. Violence has nothing, absolutely nothing, to offer except misery and destruction.

‘Choose life, I say, choose goodness, choose peace. That is what God is asking of you. That is what the people of all traditions have been saying to all of us, loud and clear, since the moment of Ronan’s tragic death on Saturday last - ‘We do not want this. You do not act in our name.’ In God’s name stop - and stop now!’

He was greeted with waves of applause.