February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Ray O’Hanlon
Irish-born Washington Post journalist Peter Finn has won this year’s Grand Prize in the annual Robert F. Kennedy journalism awards. Finn won the award for his reporting on the war in Kosovo.
A Dublin native who grew up in Roscommon, Finn spent 78 days in war-ravaged Kosovo and penned an eight-part series for the Post.
Finn well be presented with his prize by Ethel Kennedy and her daughter Rory Kennedy at a ceremony on Thursday, May 11, in Arlington, Va. Now in its 32nd year, the RFK Journalism awards were founded in 1968 by journalists and dedicated to Rory, the senator’s youngest child.
Finnegans Awake in S.F.
The largest ever Irish literary festival on the U.S. West Coast kicks off this week with four days of readings by more than 20 of Ireland’s leading contemporary writers. The festival, entitled "Finnegans Awake," is jointly sponsored by the Irish Consulate in San Francisco and the Irish Arts Foundation. The twin venues are Stanford University and Golden Gate University. Festival sessions will run May 4-7. Two of the sessions are being broadcast in a "Live Webcast" on the Irish Foundation website, www.iaf.org. The first webcast is on Saturday, May 6, at 5 p.m. EST, 2 p.m. Pacific time, while the second is Sunday, May 7, at the same time.
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Hevesi, Crowley concern
New York City Comptroller Alan Hevesi has written Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson expressing his "deep concern" and "dismay" over the state of the peace process.
Hevesi urged Mandelson to reinstate the suspended power sharing executive and to "energetically pursue" the reform agenda embodied in the Good Friday agreement.
"While your government has committed itself to moving forward on these issues, I have serious doubts about the existence of a similar commitment to reform on the part of many officials in the civil service," Hevesi wrote.
Meanwhile, Rep. Joe Crowley has also written a letter to Northern Ireland secretary, in his case urging Mandelson to "correct" the discrimination faced by Catholics in the senior ranks of the North’s civil service.
"Although Catholics make up over 42 percent of the population in Northern Ireland, they account for only 24 percent in the senior ranks of the civil service," Crowley said.
"A low level of Catholics serving in important government positions has a negative effect on efforts to promote the peace process and build trust within the Catholic community," Crowley added.
Thirty-six members of the House of Representatives have co-signed the Queens Democrat’s letter.
Very Briefly
€ Sinn Féin Assembly member Dara O’Hagan is holding a public meeting in Swifts on East 4th Street, between Lafayette and Bowery, in Manhattan on Monday, May 8, at 8 p.m. Details, (718) 418-3760.
€ Bernadette Devlin McAliskey will be discussing the current state of the peace process in Rocky Sullivan’s, Lexington Avenue between 28th and 29th Streets, on Wednesday, May 3, at 8 p.m. Details, (212) 725-3871 or www.rockysullivans.com.
€ The American Ireland Fund celebrates its 25th anniversary this week with a dinner dance at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York during which the AIF’s two founders, Tony O’Reilly and Daniel Rooney, will be honored. The dinner is set for Thursday, May 4, and tickets start at $675 per person.
€ Irish American Democratic Women, an offshoot of the fund-raising group Irish American Democrats, is organizing an outing to the Democratic Party State Convention in Albany, N.Y., on Tuesday, May 16. The group is traveling to show its support for Hillary Rodham Clinton’s Senate campaign. For travel details, call Stella O’Leary at (202)362-9064.