Workers Revolutionary Party
BY FRA HUGHES
‘THEY will not criminalise us, rob us of our true identity, steal our individualism, depoliticise us, churn us out as systemised, institutionalised, decent law-abiding robots. Never will they label our liberation struggle as criminal,’ Bobby Sands.
The 1980 Hunger Strike led by Brendan Hughes comprised of seven Republican male prisoners at Her Majesty’s Cellular Prison, the Maze, also known as Long Kesh Prison Camp and three female Republican prisoners at Armagh Women’s Prison ended in December 1980 after 53 days.
An agreement was reached between the protesting prisoners, the prison authorities and by extension the British Government ending the Hunger Strike. The prisoners demanding the reinstatement of Special Category Status were Republican volunteers jailed for opposing politically and militarily the British occupation of Ireland were treated as POWs, Prisoners of War.