Irish Examiner view: Watershed moment rooted in toxic politics

On the 50th anniversary of internment, what is its legacy?

British soldiers dragging a demonstrator on Divis Street in Belfast, after violence following a rally to mark the fourth anniversary of internment in August 1975. Picture:  Keystone/Getty Images

Today marks the 50th anniversary of a watershed in our history. On Monday, August 9, 1971, relationships between communities on this island, those communities’ relationship with politics, and relationships between these islands were reframed in dramatic, toxic ways. Internment without trial was introduced and the ensuing chaos was the significant contributory factor to three decades of murder and mayhem, more than 3,500 deaths, and almost unknown injury and tragedy. A fuse was lit and the outcome was inevitable. Dysfunction, to one degree or another, endures.

Though called Operation Demetrius, it could not hide behind such cynical Oxbridge branding today. Would it be called ethnic cleansing? Within 48 hours of the first door smashing, around 7,000 people were forced to flee their homes, hundreds crossing the border southward. In those two days, the death toll stood at 17, among them 10 Catholic civilians shot by the British army. Those who would cower at the ethnic cleansing charge need only consider the facts. Internment was used until December 1975 and 1,981 people were held; 1,874 were nationalists, just 107 were loyalists, the first of whom were not interned until February, 1973. The early internees were so badly treated — tortured — that in November 1971 our government brought allegations of brutality to the European Court of Human Rights.