The IRA wanted to exclude Sinn Fein from peace talks with Britain and thought the party was too urban and socialist, a newly released file suggests.
A secret diplomatic note exposes a deep split between the terrorist leaders in prison and the politicians who were wooing republicans to vote.
Gerry Adams and the late Martin McGuinness, the Sinn Fein leaders, were accused without conclusive evidence of being members of the IRA’s ruling army council, but the document portrays the groups as distant. It challenges the notion that Sinn Fein was a front for the IRA.
The paper, released under Ireland’s 30-year rule, outlines a peace proposal by the army council conveyed to Will Murphy, the Church of Ireland chaplain at the paramilitary Maze prison in
