of

so that was uh iran's ambassador in damascus giving his statement and of course an exclusive interview to iran's national television explaining more about the details of this attack on the iranian consulate in damascus definitely crossing a red line in the words of the ambassador himself attacking of a diplomatic mission and also he did mention that there are five to seven people uh that might have lost their lives in this attack. let's go back to our guest from toronto feros al-najim, human rights activist who was about to tell us more about the uh this attack and its implications. mr. al-najim, well it seems in that we don't have mr. najimu with us, for the time being i'm gonna have to say goodbye,

back with you with more updates on this recent story. hello, i'm sean murray, and this is the conversation where we take an alternative look at political events and current affairs through annaries lens. in this show we hope to pick, probe, investigate and uncover the stories that you want to hear. we go or mainstream won't go. this week we talked to a man that defied all odds after he was seriously injured during a gun and bomb attack that killed three of his fellow bond members in july 1975. going to become a beacon of raconsililly. my next guest has

embodied the essence of the iris peace process, but before we speak to our next guest, let's get a quick overview on this week's topic. so let's introduce today's guest. joining me today is steve trovers, a former bis guitarist in the miami show bond. steve survived horrific attack by the loyals paramelogy group, the olster volunteer force, that took the lives of his three friends and bondmits. steve, welcome to the show. thanks

shan, nice to be here. i usually begin by asking the generic question of of your childhood growing up, but i would like to get of to the cracks of of of our conversation today. which is the story of what had happened in the 31st of july 1975, sure. um, well, like most um young fellows growing up in the 60's, we all wanted to be the beetles, we wanted to join the beetles and be pop stars, and um, as far as living, i was living down in carrick insurance to parary, so as far as the uh, the north was concerned and may as well have been the north pole um, shame we say that now uh, but um, i started playing and it was the easiest thing that i ever did uh, it was easier than than having a real job, and so i was head hunted by number of of bands and uh, one of them was the miami

show band, the band was huge band, it had been going for a long time, but they changed the the lineup over the years, people used to come and go, it was institution really that band, uh, our lead singer... tool was was a your archetypical sort of pop pop star and um the band was also doing its own material so it was an attractive thing for me to join that band uh and uh hit the ground running really in uh start of june uh 1975 and we were being the summer summer time we would have been playing six seven nights a week um and anna and i had just we we been married the year before, you it's almost like a honeymoon period when you join a band like that, you get to know new friends and everybody is friendly, and we were uh, i always like emphasize the fact that we were mixed band, we were catholics and protestants

from north and south, although i had no idea who was, i mean obviously the accens would give the likes of ray and dez and brian away because clearly they were from the north, but with regard to really... or politics, i had no idea what anybody was, and um, we were, we're playing and um, remember that particular weekend, uh, the weekend, last weekend, suppose, really in july 75, we had been playing at the golwall races and we had been playing there, we played there on the monday and the tuesday, when we got home after the two nights, we um, we would normally have... tuesday off because we were playing on the monday and tuesday, the night that we were due to have off, we'd like to have one night off a week, but the night we were due to have off was the thursday night uh, but we still had one gig to do and that was in bandbridge, in um county down just just north of of nuri, there was plans

already set, well set in in in motion um to to try to frame the band, members of the band as ' uh running guns basically or bombs or whatever it was uh for for the ira, so we would have in, it was false flag operation obviously, and um we finished the dance, ray went home to antrum uh in his own car, because we had the following night off, the thursday night off, so there's five of us got back into the minibus, we had a volkswagen minibus uh, for the personnel, we didn't travel with the equipment, the only equip we carried was our our guitar, so tony garty and i, tony was lead player, i was base player, we carried our equipment, sometimes we would have brought dez macaley, desly as he called himself, his saxophone with him, and we that

was the case that night, so this is tony's guitar, my guitar and z's car, and if you if you know the the way they're constructed those um volkswagen, minibuses there's the engine is in the back and there's a little shelf at the back so you can lift a window over the engine and there was a little shelf and that's where we used to put those instruments, we wouldn't give our guitars to the road because rodies are inclined to throw stuff into the van and you know it's a bit like somebody working an airline you know with your case uh you couldn't be sure so we were precious about them and um we were in good form because it's relatively short journey from from banbridge to dublin, we were we were based in dublin, and normally uh some of the lads, if it's a longest journey, the lads would be nodding off after a while, and i was a bit of a insomniac, so i would always sit up beside brian, brian mccoy who

was our trumpet player, and brian was always drove the personnel van as well, he kept it at home, and um, so we uh, but because everybody was was... awake and they had no intention of sleeping on the way home, uh, i claim back into the back to chat with tony, we were talking about guitars, we're about six miles from north of nuria at this time, we weren't long out of vanb'. brian turned back to us and said we've got to stop there's a road block and you come across these 1975 the troubles were were raging so uh um we knew the drill at least the lads i i was i was the least experienced uh traveling in the northern with stops and road blocks but the lads knew the drill and i got to know them very quickly you stopped turned on your interior lights you turned off your main lights you let your side lights on. "and you approached when you're told to approach, there was a man with a red torch, on this particular time uh, we were surprised that

brian said almost apologitically, he was a real gentleman brain, and he said, that's we've got to get out, these gentlemen want to do a check on the van, and for me being the new recruit from way down south in south teperary, i thought it was a big adventure, and it was, you, it was something that you go home and tell and you know what, we were stuffed with by a man with the gone or whatever." ever you know, but um, there's a sliding drawer on the on on the side of the the minibus, just pull it across and lads piled out, and i was the last one out, um, and um, as i got out, i noticed that there was a number of soldiers there, no, i wouldn't have known one uniform from another, um, but uh, these were also a darkish type of uniform. and apparently this was udr uniforms that they were wearing and um some of the men

were hunkered down or they were all friendly to be honest with you um and they told us to line up uh facing the the hedge and at the hedge there was um there was a drop of about the meters down into in into the field in front of us and they told us put our hands on our heads and so you know intertwine your fingers and put put your hands on yeah this was just to the adventure for me and uh, as i say, there was five of us, ray was gone home, so i was in the middle, and tony garty arpler was on my left, and fran was on his left, and then on my right, dez m, des lee was on, no, actually, brian mccoy was was on my right, and dez was on his on his right, and dez was in, touching, touching distance of the back the the fan, that's how close we were to it, and there were there was banter between the soldiers and and ourselves and they were

saying uh one of them, i remember one of them said, i bet you lads would rather be at home in bed than standing out here at the side of the road, and fran, fran otul, our singer was witty fella, and he said, i bet you lads would rather be at home and bed than sitting a ditch, because some of them were hunkering down, and i was fascinated by that the guns they had, these sort of rifles with perforated barrels, i think there were sub machine guns or something like that, and and one was laying across this man's legs and as i say he was hunger down, there was another man he seemed to be in charge and um and he was giving the orders and there was another man there, the man that i think he may have been the person that stopped us and told us to pull in um, he had notebook and just before we pulled in there was a car coming up behind us and and when he told us to to get out brian said, can i pull into the side of the road, there's a car coming up bef fast behind us? and he told us, yeah, that's fine.

so we're standing there and and um, and everything was very relaxed, and the man in charge told the man with notebook to get our names and addresses, and so he started at at at fran, and um, he asked fran his name and address and fran was giving a tum, he was about to... ask tony his, and this this another man appeared on the scene and uh, i hadn't seen him, no, i'm not sure if he arrived in the car that was pulling up, coming up behind us, because that particular car never passed us, and um, but this man when he arrived, uh, everything changed, the atmosphere changed, and uh, he had lighter color fatigues. uh and and it was actually fascinating buse because he had a side arm

and he had lighter color berries like sort of fawn color berry as opposed to the green ones that the other men were us had and he asked he asked the man who appeared to be in charge what the man with the notebook was doing and the minute he started to talk i recognized you this is this is an english man and um the men that were hungry. down were standing up now and everybody was, it it it appeared as if they were more professional, and this man definitely took charge, and i was just fascinated by this this soldier who was who was uh... made everything that that bit sort of uh more professional and as i say brian mccoy was standing beside me and he he nudged my elbow with his and uh he said uh this is british army and what he meant was was that you know this should be done professionally and i heard a click they had opened the back

of our van that little shelf and i heard a click. "this is just actually just before the arrived, i heard this click and they were opening the guitar cases and i'll tell you how you know i didn't take it seriously, i took my hands down and i turned around and i walked back to the back of the the minibus and i said to him, can i help you with that? i didn't want them touching, i had very unusual guitar, it was a was called a dan armstrong base, it was a plexi glass, you could see through it, it was like a glass base." and there was only about four in the country, phil phill in it had one, brush shields had one, i had one, there was about was about four of us had them uh, and we were precious about them, yeah, and so uh, he - there was two men at the back and and and they pointed out a little case, had a little like a little school, like a little brown

school case type thing, and they said what's in that, i said it's a pedals, it was unusual enough for base bar to be using effects pedals in 75, but i had wa pedal and an octav divider which was called a color sound octavider and and he said, are there any valuables in and i said no, was i was surprised that you would even ask that, but in hindsight, i think maybe he was asking where the you know was the take the money from the gig or something, i don't know what he what he meant, but we wouldn't have been carrying that, the road he would have done all. that um and when i said no, he turned me around and punched me in the back and knocked me back into line and um but this time instead of being in the middle i was i was next to dez was between dez and brian so i was second from the van uh brian was reassuring me and he he nudged me and he said this is british army will be away soon and he

actually said british army which was important because later on we were able to verify that um uh anyway um and dez chirped in as well and both of these lads are from the north, dez are from belfast and bryan's from calidon and they would have grown up and know the you know different accents as well and with train musicians ears they would know that this is a british but uh and he also said the the army is usually careful with the equipment so that was a comforting thing what we didn't know was that there were to... had taken a 10-pound bomb uh commercial explosives and they were putting it under the driver seat for years we thought that the that this thing was placed in the back which was actually the were placing it under the driver seat and um the plan was uh to that we wouldn't know anything about this this bomb

that they were putting under thing and we they would have said thanks very much for your cooperation we would have driven off and according to forensics uh, it was, it would have, it would have gone off between 10 and 15 minutes uh, after after we left, so nobody would have known about the uh about the road block uh, and we would have been, people would have said, well these fellows were carrying bombs, maybe for the ira or whatever, and um, so who can we trust, and they would have put pressure then on the irish government to have shut down, basically has... more stringent security on the border, because at the time, if the ira had maybe there was some sort of an outrage and they would have crossed over the border, they were reasonably safe because not because the irish government wanted it like that, but because the tds along the border counties didn't want to disrupt the normal life of people who

would have been crossing the border a daily basis for maybe petrol or groceries, which might have been cheap. at the you know on the northern side and uh so that was the reluctance it wasn't for anything else and um but it it didn't work the the plan didn't work they were using a wrist watch timing mechanism and um for one reason or another maybe it maybe they tilted it the wrong way or i don't know anything about these bombs but this thing exploded and uh the two unfortunate men that were planting this bomb like the were blown to pieces, the tore the head off one person, the legs off and the arms off another, but it was very little left them, you know, i remember seeing the autopsy reports. and they were uh shocking the damage, but when it went off, um, as i say, we were standing right beside it, and you the

pictures, the pictures all over the place of the of of the wreckage, i mean, there was little or nothing left, and um, it lifted me up into the air, and i remember you, being aware that something happen was was happening, and i often say that the whole world turned red, it actually, that's what it looked like. to me and maybe it was the flames or whatever um and was i tried to run but was in the air so it was i couldn't get any porches on my feet you know and uh i could hear guns going off it was like as as if was in slow motion i was just raised up into the air and then i started to go down through the ditch as i say it was about a 3 meter drop into the field and as i was going down through the ditch i felt almost like like time was was was was was coming to a stop and even through my clothes i could

count every single leaf and bramble and every single thing that that i was touching like now whether that's a heightened awareness through from adrenaline adrenaline or something like i don't know but was i was very aware of all of that and then all of sudden uh time went back. normal and hit the ground very hard uh and instantly there was two more people fell top of me and i think it may well have been uh tony and fran now dez was blown through separate there was a trees and he was blown separately off a bit to the right uh so there was the two lads fell top of me and um and somebody then..." put their arms, their hands under my arm, apparently i was shot while i was in the air, i didn't, i i wasn't, i didn't realize i was shot, but i was shot with what they call a dum dum

bullet, which is specifically designed to explode on impact, and it it hit me just over my right hip, and when it entered my body, it exploded into 17 pieces, so it was and these things explode when they... and and it did a lot of internal damage and then part of it continued on and it through my left lung and out under my my left arm so it went right across the body and somebody put their hands under my arms and started to to drag me uh maybe to try to get me to stand up but was a dead weight at that stage and um and while he was i'm very reluctant to say it was brain i'm pretty certain at was br brian mccay um and the reason i'm looking to say it is because i feel guilty that he was murder dragging me trying to drag me away from the

thing and he was you know protestant lad from callidon in county toron and and i'm a catholic from south teperaria and he's dragging me out trying to drag me away from what's happening and he was shot in the head and the back and because the soldiers jumped. down after us and started to started to to kill everyb, started to shoot everybody, and um, so brian was lying beside me and i was lying on the ground and i, i kept my, i kept my face, i always remember that my cheek in the grass i just lying down wondering what what's happening, and i could hear the others, the soldiers then caught up with fran and and and tony and... they didn't get very far, they tried to run away, but they um, i could hear the the the the the crying and the begging for you, and and fran was laying on the ground and he was facing them and he

asking him not to kill him, and they stood over him, and they shot fran, our singer 22 times and seven of those were in the face, he was particularly good looking young lad, you know, and um, and um, and shot tony in the back of the head, and um, number of times as well, and uh, one of the things that stands out for me was the obsenities, the the coursing and the swing, the shouting and roaring of the soldiers, like real anger, it was quite frightening, yeah, and uh, when the shooting stopped, then um, i could hear uh, at least one soldier was walking around, and he was firing into the bodies to make sure there were depth. well dead and he walked over and brown was was lying beside me, brown was dead as well, and he started kicking brian ferociously, was like giving a

really... kicking into him and uh and and shouting and screaming and then he walked, i was like about two feet away from that and he turned to me and he stood over me and um i was uh wonder will i get up will beg you know will ask him not to but i had heard didn't do the that's a lot of good you know so i i just stayed quiet and um 'i thought he was going to fire into me and i was saying i thought it's a be quick uh and just as he stood over me and he had a pistol um somebody on on the road shouted down come on those bastards are dead i got them with dum dumbs i didn't know what a dum dumb was but i heard him say that very clearly the des had been blown as i say off to the right into into the field but he was he was lying closer to the ditch the

ditch was on fire there was a danger that he would have been born alive, but he he he didn't budge either, he was, but they didn't see him, and uh, so i i still thought that when the man said those bastards are dead, i got them with them, that he he would have, i thought he's still going to fire cuz he was still standing there, and he turned around miraculously, he started to walk away, and uh, every, every step that he took, i was saying to himself, "i hope he takes another step because the he may not be that accurate if and was determined not to not to show it out if he if if if he fired after a while there you seemed to be gone and then i heard a voice calling - he said or fran, tony, brian, then said steve, and uh, i was the only one to answer, i was, i was amazed that the other guys didn't answer, because i was,

i was expecting them to to answer." but um they uh there was no they were dead obviously and it was it was de and he said are you okay and typical irish i said uh i'm grand uh i wasn't in pain or anything like that it didn't feel anything and so dez got up onto the road and as he often says it was carnage on the road um a truck came down uh a lorry and um he asked the the truck driver is i need to get into the police station to report this, the truck driver didn't know whether he was involved in this wouldn't take him and then a car came along, they had to sort of stop and maneuver because there was a lot of the the the bits and pieces of the van was all over the road and um was so eventually

des got into in into uh into the police station in neuri and um i was i was trying to figure out, i rolled over my back, i was trying to figure out what what's just happened here, and i thought that these soldiers had been had been attacked by the ira and that we were caught in the crossfire, that's what that's the only way i could figure it out, because i completely trusted the soldiers, i was brought up to whether is a policeman or a soldier or postman or... you wore a uniform, you're a good person you know, and you had to be had to des deserved respect, but it was always remember there was absolutely beautiful, beautiful night, i was staring up at the it was about a half moon there and it's very warm, very warm weather, but this was about maybe about quarter past nearly half two in the morning, and um still trying to figure it out and i was lying on my back and i counted my fingers to see if if

there was any damage done cuz as a musician obviously it's important. i remember tapping my my feet together and we used to wear these ridiculous platform shoes at the time it was the style and heard my i could click my my my my feet together and i knew that i still had my feet. now i don't know why it down on me that i should do this uh but there was a terrible smell of it's other way to describe it like meat cooking. meat uh, because when apparently i didn't know this at the time, but if somebody is shot a number of times with the machine gun or whatever it is, it's the bullets are so hot, they actually cook the flesh, and there was a the smell of burning blood uh was was terrible, and um, i, i got up, i sort of half sat up, and i was able to do that, and i turned around and i

kneeled up, and then i i stood up and i noticed that my stomach was extended, i couldn't find any blood, so i said, i heard that man saying dom dum, they were, that means it was dummy. that's what i i said to myself, these weren't real bullets at all, so dumbdums must mean because you couldn't find any blood, for the audience to take dum dum bullets are explosive bullets, dum dum bullets are explosive, and so all my bleeding was internal and my stomach extended out, very big, i couldn't figure out why that was, i still had no pain, um, when i i managed to stand up i fell down again and and i'd stand up and i'd fall down again so decided the best way to get around was to was was to crawl around on my stomach and pull myself around and sometimes i'd kneel and push

myself forward, i knew there was something wrong because i found it difficult to breathe because the bullet had collapsed my left lung and uh the first one i was able to reach out to to brian and i shook him. uh, i said, brian, you okay, and there's no answer, and - i i said, he's have to get, he's been knocked out, he's he's out for the count, so i crawled over to um, to towards fran, and i won't say the state he was in, but you know, uh, i was, i, i, i said to him, dez is gone, and he'd be back soon, so and we can, we'll all go home, and i crawled over to tony, and tony likeis, his injuries were bad, he had been, one of the bullets had gone through the back of his head, knocked out his eye onto his cheek and it was uh, it was terrible and and and '