The Five Demands

Bobby Sands ‘offered to suspend hunger strike’ (Rté)
Newly-released State Papers from 1981 claim that Bobby Sands offered to suspend his hunger strike just a week before his death.
According to the documents released this morning under the 30-year rule, the offer was conveyed to the British Government by the Pope’s Secretary, John Magee.
30 years on, and Government archives in Dublin, Belfast and London are opened today, giving new insights into the events of 1981.
The year was dominated by the H-Block hunger strikes in Northern Ireland, in which ten men died, starting with Bobby Sands.
The papers contain the claim that just a week before his death, Sands offered to suspend his strike for five days, when he met John Magee, then Secretary to the Pope, who later became Bishop of Cloyne.
Father Magee told Northern Secretary Humphrey Atkins that Sands said he would suspend his strike in return for discussions with a British government official, in the presence of two priests and three other prisoners as witnesses.
The British rejected the offer out of hand, claiming it was an attempt to open negotiations.
Senior Republicans involved in the hunger strike have told RTÉ News they had never heard of such an offer, which they say went against everything Bobby Sands did and said during the hunger strike.