Sadly, not able to make to the opening concert tonight of the Ulster Bank Belfast Festival at Queen's . Valery Gergiev and St Petersburg's Mariinsky Orchestra both bring formidable reputations to Belfast and their version of...

This is your 'heads up' for what ought to be a thought-provoking speech on human rights in Northern Ireland. This year's Stephen Livingstone Lecture takes place next Wednesday (21 October) at 5:30pm, Room G07 in the Peter Froggatt...

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Belfast yesterday urging politicians and people to keep moving forward to peace. Speaking to a full house at the Northern Ireland Assembly, she noted “that there are still those looking to...

Northern Ireland's political class is utterly focused today on the visit of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton . As I write, her motorcade is en route to Stormont to meet the First and Deputy First Minister and to address the...

There's something about Mary I'm a long self-confessed fan of Mary Robinson . I even had the chance to host her in Belfast last year when she gave the Amnesty International Annual Lecture. The former Irish President and UN High...

It's National Poetry Day . As good an excuse as any for a visit to verse. As is my wont, I'll use the opportunity to highlight a favoured human rights poem and invite your own suggestions. Last year it was Seamus Heaney's From the...

Shaun Woodward keeps saying that the transfer of policing and justice powers to the Northern Ireland Assembly – the subject of talks in Downing Street today – is "the final part of the jigsaw" . The Northern Ireland Secretary of State...

During the summer, a church near where I live advertised its gospel mission with the slogan: "Worried about your job? Trust God." In the midst of a recession, with anxiety high about redundacies, mortgage defaults and unpaid bills, a...

Alan in Belfast has done a better summary of the East Belfast Speaks Out event from earlier this week than I could hope to. In the comments section he even includes a link to the BBC radio news report from the event, which features...

This event has already been picked up on the Northern Ireland blogosphere over on Slugger and on Alan in Belfast but, seeing as I'm one of the panellists, I'll give it a plug here too! East Belfast Speaks Out is basically (the hugely...

I reviewed this new comedy / politics documentary film for the BBC's Sunday Sequence programme, along with actor and writer Dan Gordon (you can listen again, here , 22mins 30secs in). I'd never heard of the Yes Men before now –...

In my day, a snog at the end of the ceilí at Loch an Iúir during Irish language summer camp – Donegal Gaeltacht-style – would get you no more bother than a ribbing from your house mates and a red face when you met the girl at class the...

The First Minister and DUP leader Peter Robinson has been making a bid for his party's representatives to have seats on the Equality Commission when they come up for appointment later this year. If the DUP want to be taken seriously on...

With her green silk headscarf, designer sunglasses and classic Persian features, she was every inch the Iranian beauty. Yet when the UTV camera crew hoved into view, she moved off to the side. When Donal, our photographer for the day...

Sonia Sotomayor , the soon-to-be-confirmed , Obama-nominated US Supreme Court judge, has been the subject of much debate in the American (and indeed local ) blogosphere. Is she liberal, conservative, pro-choice, anti-death penalty...

New revelations have emerged from Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) that the Bush White House may have helped to cover up a reported massacre in Afghanistan in 2001 by a CIA-payrolled warlord. Using forensic analysis and satellite...

As NASA's PR machine gears up to mark the fortieth anniversary of the moon landings, it's time to take an alternative look ( also see previous blog: 'Moonwalk this: rockets or rickets? ' ) at this stunning human achievement. It's my...

This blog has previously noted the suspicious shadow cast over intelligence about the Omagh bombing. There is little doubt who caused the death of 29 people and two unborn children – the 'dissident' republican paramilitary group known...

Amnesty International is using the latest in advertising technology to challenge the scourge of domestic violence. This Amnesty bus stop advertisement, recently erected in Hamburg, changes whether or not someone's looking at it. Using...

Will the outgoing Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde leave a multi-million pound, Taser-sized headache behind for his successor and the NI Policing Board? That could be the prospect facing the new PSNI chief following the settlement of a...