The threatened closure of a facility catering for pensioners with mental health problems is tantamount to elder abuse, according to one of the most prominent GPs in the country.

BALLOON STOLEN AT ALBUQUERQUE BALLOON FEST

The decision to charge a leading republican with IRA membership was politically motivated, Sinn Féin claimed today.

PRISON bosses are planning to address persistent problems regarding the supply of drugs over jail walls and the lack of security cameras in key prisons.

The Chinese prison where Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo is held has suspended visits by his family members and his wife remains under house arrest, a week after the award ceremony, a human rights group said today.

PRISON bosses said there are plans to set up a methadone service in Cork Prison — but are not certain when it will begin operating.

One of the country’s longest serving prison governors, John Lonergan, is to retire from Mountjoy next month, it was confirmed today.

Catherine Nevin was today acquitted of possessing a mobile phone at the Dochas centre, in Mountjoy prison, nearly two years ago.

More than 40 prison officers have been taken on to staff 550 extra jail spaces despite a recruitment embargo, it was revealed today.

A 22-year-old inmate has been found dead in his cell at the Midlands Prison in Portlaoise this morning.

The drug free Training Unit in Mountjoy Prison should be kept in Dublin and not moved to a new complex miles from the capital, the Inspector of Prisons said today.

A DAMNING report into the detention of women and girls in a prison was issued by the North’s province’s Human Rights Commission yesterday.

The British government was today accused of dragging its heels over the setting up of public inquiries into controversial killings in Northern Ireland.

Almost 50 inmates were moved from the Curragh prison in Co Kildare today in the first phase of Government plans to close the facility.

SINN FÉIN held out the hand of friendship to the Labour Party yesterday seeking closer co-operation between the parties of the left in Dáil Éireann.

Two dissident republican prisoners have been brutally beaten by a gang of loyalists inside a top security Northern Ireland jail, it emerged tonight.

The alleged leader of Irish republican splinter group the Real IRA, was due to appear in court today where a date would be set for his trial for directing terrorism.

Train robber Ronnie Biggs was today getting married behind bars at Belmarsh top-security prison.

If either of the Libyans is convicted of mass murder, they must serve their life term in a Scottish prison.