McGuinness to run for Irish presidency

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness is to run for president of the Republic of Ireland next month as part of what he called a bid to bring about Irish reunification by peaceful means. The candidature of 61-year-old McGuinness for the October 27 election is expected to be rubber-stamped by the executive council of his Sinn Fein party on Sunday. McGuinness, who admits being a commander of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) paramilitary group during the three decades of violence in Northern Ireland, would be the first candidate from the hardline Catholic socialist party to run for the Irish presidency. The bid will be seen by many north and south of the border in Ireland as an audacious move. McGuinness was branded the mastermind of the IRA during the decades of sectarian bombings and shootings in Northern Ireland but later became a champion of the peace process in the province, which remains part of the United Kingdom. "I hope that my campaign will give citizens the opportunity to make a stand for the new Ireland," McGuinness said. Speaking during an investment trip to the United States, he said he believed that those who voted for him in Northern Ireland would be pleased with his decision. "They will be very happy that I, as an Irish republican from the North, will be prepared to stand for the Irish presidency," the BBC quoted him as saying. "The whole all-Ireland nature of the agreements that we have made make it incumbent upon all of us to continue to bring about -- I hope -- the reunification of Ireland by purely peaceful and democratic means." If elected he would have to give up his current role while a Sinn Fein colleague is likely to fill in for him during the campaign. McGuinness remains a highly divisive figure in Ireland. He has admitted he was the IRA's number two in Londonderry, Northern Ireland, in 1972 when 13 people died after British soldiers opened fire on a civil rights march in what became known as Bloody Sunday. He was jailed in the Republic for terror offences. But when peace accords in 1998 largely brought an end to the three decades of violence known as the Troubles, McGuinness amazed many by entering a government with the man who was formerly his bitter foe, the firebrand Protestant leader Ian Paisley. The next Irish president faces the prospect of following two historic periods of office by Mary McAleese and, before her, Mary Robinson. The two women are seen to have broadened the role of the presidency to provide a platform for the marginalised and to build bridges between Catholics and Protestants across Ireland, north and south. Labour Party candidate Michael D. Higgins remains the front-runner in the race to succeed McAleese, according to the latest poll last week. Higgins has 36 percent of the first preference vote, with Gay Mitchell, the candidate of Fine Gael -- which governs Ireland in a coalition with junior partners Labour -- second with 24 percent. Meanwhile a senator who last month abandoned his bid to become Ireland's first gay president, after controversy involving a former lover, said Friday he "hoped" to get the backing of the 20 parliamentarians required to allow him to re-enter the race. David Norris, 67, withdrew after it emerged that he wrote to the Israeli authorities pleading for clemency for his former partner Ezra Yitzhak, who was accused of the statutory rape of a 15-year-old Palestinian boy in 1992. Yitzhak pleaded guilty to the charge and was convicted in 1997. Norris told RTE television: "I think people love a comeback. This would be the biggest comeback in Irish political history.