Greetings from suprisingly-sunny Belfast!

I arrived in Belfast on June 4th and began working at the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ). I am living with a wonderful housemate in an area of east Belfast called Ballyhackamore and I am very happy here! I spent the first week or so adjusting to the time change (+5hrs), resting after a whirlwind (and amazing) trip to Tanzania with the Crowley program, finging my way around town, and getting settled into my job.

Working at CAJ has been a real pleasure so far. The people in Northern Ireland (NI) are sweet and friendly beyond belief and are quick to help with anything I need. My main task at CAJ is to work on their campaign for a Bill of Rights for NI. A Bill of Rights was promised in the Belfast Good Friday Agreement in 1998 at the close of the Troubles. It's been a long and difficult road for the proposed Bill of Rights sense then and NI is still left out in the cold without this important constitutional safeguard. Britain doesn't have a Bill of Rights either- so it goes without a written constitution- but from a strictly US perspective a Bill of Rights is a foundational document that not only protects citizens from the government and from each other, but also defines the values of the society. This is particularly important for a post-conflict, and still divided, society. As it stands now, the recent consultation on a Bill of Rights put out by the Northern Ireland Office (NIO) is a giant step backwards for the campaign and has caused great distress and frustration in the community and voluntary sector. So this issue will be my focus for this summer...

On a different note, I had the great pleasure of being in Derry for the release of Saville's Bloody Sunday Report. The day was imbued with not only a potent sense of history and memory, but also with the current tensions and painst that linger over thirty plus years of intimacy with conflict. The momen I'm guessing everyone will continue to talk about is when the victims' familites, who read and were briefed on the report summary before the rest of the public, reached their hands out the windows of the church above the waiting crowd and gave the thumbs-up...the crowd of thousands erupted into shouts of joy and ecstatic applause. Essentially the report stated that there was absolutely no justification for the shooting of civilians by the British on Bloody Sunday--the key words being that the shootings were unjustified and unjustifable. I recommend reading up on this particular even and inquiry for anyone interested in issues surrounding societies in post-conflict situations and "dealign with the past."

Overall my time in Belfast has been wonderful so far. I'm really enjoying living here, getting the needed break from NYC (sorry--but it's true!) and gaining some great perspective on NI. I promise to update this blog more frequently...safe travels everyone and happy summer!