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The IRA hunger strikes
An Irish republican prisoner, Bobby Sands, died in a British jail in Northern Ireland on May 5th 1981. He had been on hunger strike since the beginning of March.
In 1981 the British government was faced with prisoners dying on hunger strike in a jail in Northern Ireland. The Irish republican activists were demanding to be treated as political prisoners not criminals. Several of them died during the hunger strike, the first, Bobby Sands on May 5th 1981. Louise Hidalgo spoke to Laurence McKeown who took part in the protest but survived.
(Photo: Protestors wearing balaclavas in support of the hunger strike. Credit: AFP/Getty Images)
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