BELFAST - The story of the Maze is the story of the Troubles. For the past 29 years this bleak, grey prison on the outskirts of Belfast has symbolised the unforgiving violence and the bitterness of Ulster's civil war.
The Maze held the ruthless killers and bombers of this war. And the release yesterday of one of the most notorious of those prisoners, mass murderer Michael Stone, effectively signalled its closure.
Stone is the first of a batch of around 90 paramilitaries, loyalist and republican, who will be freed by the end of the week under the Good Friday Agreement, many after serving just a fraction of their sentences. A handful of others will be left behind, but they too are expected to be released within months or moved to other jails.
With its notorious H-blocks, hunger strikes, murders among inmates and tales of beatings by staff, the Maze had become the most emotive and controversial prison in the United Kingdom.
With the peace agreement, there was a feeling that it was too much of a reminder of the dark past. What happens to the 52ha site is uncertain.
One plan is to turn it into a museum, another to have it dismantled.
The end of the prison, still known by its former name of Long Kesh by both nationalists and loyalists, came surrounded with the controversy with which it had begun life in 1971 as an internment camp set in an old RAF airfield.
Stone will be followed to freedom by fellow prisoners responsible for some of the most appalling atrocities of the violent strife. Among them will be Sean Kelly, sentenced to nine life terms for the IRA bombing of the Shankill Rd, which killed nine Protestants seven years ago.
Also walking out will be Torrens Knight, guilty of 11 killings, including seven at the Rising Sun pub in Greysteel, Londonderry, which was in revenge for the Shankill bomb. Knight and his accomplices shouted "trick or treat" as they sprayed the bar with bullets on Hallowe'en Night.
Also marking his day of departure will be James McArdle, who had served just two years of a 25-year sentence for his part in the London Docklands bombing in 1997 killing two civilians.
Others to be freed will include Norman Coopley, a member of the Loyalist Volunteer Force involved in the sectarian torture and murder of 16-year-old Catholic James Morgan, whose body was found near Clough, County Down, three years ago.
For many of the families bereaved by these terrorists the mass release means that justice has been taken away from them.
John McPollin, whose 26-year-old brother Kevin was killed by Stone in 1985, said what has happened was "unthinkable ... unbelievable." "I don't like talking about that man, I don't like mentioning his name. Seeing his face on newspapers and TV is just impossible."
Michelle Williamson, who lost her parents, George and Gillian, in the Shankhill bombing said it was "very sickening" that Kelly will be walking out.
"This is the man who has killed your parents smiling through the gates of the Maze prison into the bosom of his family," she said.
However, former inmates of the Maze are now leading players in the politics of Northern Ireland. The alumni include Gerry Adams and his fellow Sinn Fein assemblyman Gerry Kelly. On the other side, David Irvine and Billy Hutchinson, of the Progressive Unionist Party, have also secured seats in the assembly and are seen as two of the most vocal and articulate advocates of the peace process in the Protestant side.
Indeed, former paramilitary inmates among both loyalists and republicans say that the Maze was a vital learning process for young prisoners. The time inside was spent by many on education, honing political ideas and discussing the future. Some who emerged helped to turn their fellow terrorists towards a road of dialogue and negotiations.
But the Maze also became notorious for its confrontations. The inmates saw themselves as prisoners of war and demanded different rules and the right not to wear prison uniforms. This culminated in the IRA hunger strikes of the early 1980s when Bobby Sands and nine others starved themselves to death and became martyrs among nationalists.
Along with lessons in history and exercises, the prisoners also held classes on weaponry. Craftsmen made replica weapons for training and electricians taught others how to make the circuit boards for bombs.
One prominent republican former prisoner said: "The Maze became a rite of passage. It was our university. We learned a lot there, but an awful lot of men also suffered and died. It is a grim and desolate part of our history."
- INDEPENDENT
Controversy from the first day to the last
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