Published: 18 July, 2006

Sinn Féin MEP Bairbre de Brún has described the arrest of an Irish language school teacher in Belfast for speaking Irish as ‘treatment which brings us back to the days of the penal laws’.

Ms de Brún made her comments before she was due to attend a protest tomorrow along with Irish language activists at the Belfast court where the woman’s case will be heard.

Ms de Brún said:

“I want to express my anger at the arrest of an Irish language schoolteacher after she spoke in Irish on a Belfast street. The woman continued to speak in Irish, as is her right, and I am told that the PSNI member became abusive and pushed the woman before arresting her. She was held in a Belfast PSNI barracks before being charged with disorderly behaviour.

“Tomorrow her case comes before the courts in Belfast and I will join a picket organised by Irish language activists and speakers. This sort of behaviour by the PSNI is a throwback to the penal days. Irish language speakers will not be denied our basic right to speak our own language on our own streets by the PSNI or anyone else. That is the clear message coming from this case.” ENDS

Editors Note: The protest will take place tomorrow (Wednesday 19th July) at 10am outside the Laganside Court complex.
http://www.sinnfein.ie/news/detail/15122

have we gone back to the stone ages. People should be proud of their heritage and not want to loose it or ever forget it.
Here in Canada on the Island of PEI and New Brunswick, Gaelic is used but so few people know it or can pass it on it is such a shame. We also in BC had things like presidential schools were a lot of the Aboriginal kids were taken from the reserves and sent to school. Kids were pulled out of their homes and away from the elders and families and forces to only speak English. They were then beaten if they spoke their native tongue which ever it may have been. ( Cree or any other language ). To me this was so cruel and inhuman.