The Five Demands

Well there is no surprise in this tragic news. In fact observers have been predicting something along these lines for several months now. According to the news media a member of the British-run Northern Ireland Prison Service was killed in an ambush in County Armagh. So far reports are pointing towards an operation by Resistance Republicans, partly on the basis of briefings by the PSNI, the British paramilitary police force in the North of Ireland, who initially believed the incident was the result of a road accident.

From the Guardian newspaper:

“Dissident republicans are believed to have shot dead a Northern Ireland prison officer in a motorway ambush.

David Black, who had worked in the Northern Ireland Prison Service for more than 30 years and was nearing retirement, was shot dead on Thursday on the M1 between Lurgan and Portadown, in County Armargh.

In what has been described as an ambush, Black, from Cookstown, Co Tyrone, was killed after shots were…