{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"Holywell Trust Conversations","title":"Showing paramilitaries the exit door","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":2159,"description":"Recent weeks have seen a rise in concern about the continuing presence of paramilitaries in our society. Just how we make faster progress in removing them is the question considered in the latest Holywell Trust Conversations podcast.\nClearly, 25 years ago when the Good Friday Agreement was approved by the public, they would have expected paramilitaries to have been fully or largely removed from our society by now. Yet we still see significant activity by both loyalist and republican groups.\nShould we, though, as chief executive of Co-operation Ireland and former senior PSNI and RUC officer Peter Sheridan suggests, see some of the groups simply as organised crime gangs? Would that reflect more accurately where our society is in comparison to those places in Dublin, London and the United States, for example, which are also burdened by drug-related criminality?\nGiven that paramilitaries exercise coercive control over communities, with territories marked out by flags, is effective regulation and policing of the use of flags an essential element in asserting dominance over paramilitary groups? This is an approach favoured by Professor Dominic Bryan, who was joint chair of the commission on Flags, Identity, Culture and Tradition. And why is that commission’s report, as Bryan puts it, sitting on shelves “gathering dust”, rather than being implemented? \nDespite this sense of negativity, we should reflect on the progress achieved, especially since the Fresh Start Agreement of 2015, which identified the need to end paramilitarism “once and for all”. It established the Independent Reporting Commission to focus on this.\nThe trend since then has been downward, though it rose again in the last year. In the 12 months ending 31st May, there was one security-related death; seven bombings; 33 shootings; and 32 casualties of paramilitary assaults.\nTackling paramilitary criminality is handled jointly by the PSNI, An Garda Síochána, HMRC, the National Crime Agency and the security...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/PR1KfubV5mQbNCBb39558iwYKVHxNVNcf804_FJPYuQ/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS9zaG93/LzE3NTgvMTY4MDk4/NTg2MC1hcnR3b3Jr/LmpwZw.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}