“Sands, Bobby. Anti H-Block/Armagh Political Prisoner, 30,492”. These words of election returning officer Alastair Patterson, became in 1981 the live televised public proof of the power of republican voters. Bobby Sands was elected MP for Fermanagh-South Tyrone 43 years ago on 9 April 1981. We republish two unique first-hand accounts of the events that led to Sands victory from Jim Gibney and Danny Morrison ..read more

An Phoblacht would have been helpless without its drivers. They delivered the paper all over Ireland in challenging dangerous conditions. Earlier this month we were saddened to learn of the death of Thomas McGuigan, one of these valiant republican road warriors ..read more

March 1st marks the 43rd anniversary of the beginning of the 1981 hunger strikes. An Phoblacht will be opening our archives which house a unique repository of articles and photographs from the hunger strike period. In the coming weeks we will be profiling these pieces along with new insights into this critical period in the history of republican struggle ..read more

Writing in his latest blog, Declan Kearney said that the future of Palestine demands that the democratic world finally acts decisively in support of people's fundamental, national and human rights ..read more

39 years of electoral representation by Mid Ulster MP Francie Molloy is ending this year as the Sinn Féin veteran announced his decision not to stand in the next Westminster elections. In his own word Francie marks out key events in his long career standing up for the rights of Northern nationalists ..read more

THE late 1980s saw an escalation in the use of death squads by the British regime in the Six Counties. Since the start of the 1970s, the British Army and the RUC had manipulated loyalist paramilitary organisations as part of their counter-insurgency strategy. The aim was to terrorise the entire nationalist population, killing Catholics solely because of their religion or perceived political allegiances and, where possible, assassinating leading nationalists and republicans ..read more

IN JANUARY 1994, the armed conflict in the Six Counties was at a critical stage. The previous year had seen the deaths of 84 people in the war and, while there was some political movement, it was by no means clear that a peace process could be put in place to end the armed conflict and to address its root causes ..read more

Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, General Secretary and co-founder of Palestinian National Initiative (PNI), describes the recent events that have occurred at the al-Shifa hospital in Gaza as a scandal ..read more

“The Pogues were also unashamedly abrasive and political, at a time when being political about Ireland in Britain was no easy task”. Joe Dwyer offers a tribute to Pogues lead singer Shane MacGowan whose death was announced today ..read more

The 14 people murdered by British crown forces on Bloody Sunday, 21 November 1920, have been honoured with the naming of Bloody Sunday Bridge beside Croke Park where they were shot ..read more