Quick! Release the Algerian caught bringing the nitro in from Canada! As a 'confidence measure' of course. From drudge:

N.Irish Maze prison to release guerrillas for Xmas

Updated 7:21 PM ET December 22, 1999

LONDON, Dec 23 (Reuters) - Northern Ireland's Maze Prison is to release 139 convicted guerrilla extremists for Christmas and the New Year, the Times newspaper reported on Thursday.

Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson ordered that all inmates jailed for extremism during 30 years of strife in the British province should be let out for 12 days over the Christmas period as "a confidence measure," the paper said.

Inmates to enjoy Christmas and New Year at home include James McArdle, jailed for his part in the 1996 London Docklands bombing.

A total of 330 prisoners, including the convicted guerrillas, will be freed from Maze prison for the period.

The move comes less than a week after Britain freed top IRA guerrilla Padraig Wilson under Northern Ireland's Good Friday peace accord. Wilson had also been kept at Maze prison, outside Belfast.

Northern Ireland's peace process received a new lease of life this month following the creation of a power-sharing government of Protestants and Roman Catholics and a decision by the IRA to discuss disarming.

-- (@ .), December 22, 1999

Answers

Great,and after 12 days of freedom they are going to walk back to their cells?This guy is giving Clinton some stiff competition in stupid poeple tricks.

-- I'm (surrounded@by.idiots), December 22, 1999.

Not just in the "stupid" department.!!!

-- Chris (griffen@globalnet.co.uk), December 22, 1999.

From the Electronic Telegraph:

Thursday 23 December 1999

ALL of Northern Ireland's most notorious killers and bombers will be freed today to spend almost a fortnight with their families.

Only five men - all members of the Loyalist Volunteer Force on remand awaiting trial - will remain inside the Maze prison. Most of the 120 being released for the 12-day Christmas parole were eligible for the holiday break. However, Peter Mandelson, the Ulster Secretary, has also decided to free eight terrorists who were ineligible.

The Northern Ireland Office refused to identify the eight being given special dispensation. But one of them is understood to be James McArdle, jailed for 25 years for the London Docklands bombing in 1996 and also convicted in connection with the murder of Lance Bombadier Stephen Restorick, the last soldier to be killed in Ulster.

Among those due for temporary release under normal criteria are the loyalist Michael Stone, who attacked an IRA funeral, killing three men, in 1988; Sean Kelly, the IRA man convicted of the Shankill bombing in 1993; and the three INLA men who two Christmases ago murdered the LVF leader Billy "King Rat" Wright inside the Maze.

Mr Mandelson, who yesterday laid out his blueprint for the security strategy in the province, said the prison would close completely by the end of next year. He said he hoped that troop levels in Northern Ireland could soon be returned to "peace-time levels", many Army bases could be closed and new UK-wide counter-terrorism legislation introduced "fully consistent with human rights obligations". He said: "We are fully committed to normalising security arrangements and practices as quickly as the current threat allows."

Gerry Kelly, Sinn Fein spokesman, said Mr Mandelson's report, Security - Return to Normality, was "a weak wish list". The Ulster Unionist assembly member Danny Kennedy said: "I would want to be satisfied that there has been a real removal of the terrorist threat before any more concessions are made

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), December 23, 1999.

Christmas releases of republican prisoners have been happening for some time (they always return, you know). The pace of such events has stepped up since The Good Friday agreement. It's an essential part of the Peace Process. Irish Times article: 139 to get leave from North prisons

-- Risteard Mac Thomais (uachtaran@ireland.com), December 23, 1999.