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THE United Nations has been accused of going “rogue” and failing to provide information on the death of hero Irish soldier Private Sean Rooney in Lebanon.

Sinn Fein TD Ruairi O’Murchu said it was a disgrace that the international organisation had failed to provide vital information about the deadly incident to Sean’s family, the Dublin Coroner’s Court and the Irish Government.

Garrett White - The Sun

It had refused to provide two different reports needed for Sean’s inquest and was ignoring diplomatic efforts led by the Taoiseach Micheal Martin.

Deputy O’Murchu, who comes from Dundalk where the 23-year-old soldier was based, fumed:  “Sean Rooney paid the ultimate price and gave his life peacekeeping for the United Nations.

“And yet this same organisation is refusing to provide the crucial information that is needed by both our Government and the Dublin Coroner’s Court in establishing how exactly and why he died.

“They are also trying to ensure that mistakes in terms of protocol, and decision making that put soldiers’ lives at risk are not repeated.

“I have been in Sean’s grandfather’s house and pride of place is a framed letter there from the UN paying tribute to Sean.

“Yet the same people won’t provide the information that the family and the Irish authorities need to get to the bottom of what happened.

“The United Nations is behaving like a rogue state by not co-operating and it has to stop.

“Sean Rooney and his family deserve justice and we all must ensure it happens.”

The Taoiseach Micheal Martin confirmed that the UN had failed to respond to the Dublin Coroner’s request to access two reports on investigations it carried into the incident that led to Sean’s death.

He was killed when a convoy of Irish peacekeepers he was travelling with were ambushed in December 2022 going through a village in south Lebanon.

SEVEN ARRESTED

A preliminary Inquest last July was informed that issues had arisen over restrictions on the disclosure of information from the UN and the completed reports had not been made available.

The UN had not responded to the request from the Coroner via the Department of Defence and Foreign Affairs for a copy of these reports to be given to him.

Seven men were arrested over Sean’s murder but so far only one has been charged.

A hearing of the Lebanese criminal court dealing with the case is due to be held in Beirut on February 12 next. The Irish Government will have legal representation present.

Deputy O’Murchu added: “The UN needs to respect the memory and sacrifice of Sean Rooney and give his Inquest their full cooperation.”

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A LEGENDARY jockey is back in the big time in racing – after spending £230,000 on a ‘talking horse’ at the Cheltenham sales.

Hugely popular former rider Richard Johnson was the man behind the monster bid for five-year-old gelding Starzand.

https://twitter.com/TattsCheltenham/status/1884572202730734041

PA

The Grand National eluded him… but Richard Johnson won pretty much everything else during his amazing career as a jockey, including the Gold Cup twice[/caption]

A two-time point-to-point winner, Starzand was bought by David Lewis of Gwent Holdings with the hope of turning into a top 3m chaser.

He is by former Derby and Irish Derby winner Harzand, an up-and-coming sire who already counts the hugely promising Triumph Hurdle contender Hello Neighbour among his progeny.

Johnson purchased the horse in conjunction with Johnson White, who co-trains with Philip Hobbs at their Somerset base.

Should Starzand ultimately head their way then there will be considerable pressure on them to turn him into a winner.

He can be expected to follow a route from bumpers to hurdles and ultimately the top prizes over fences, with Cheltenham Festival success the goal.

Starzand was dubbed a ‘talking horse’ by prospective buyers because of his considerable potential, and was the one everyone buying at the auction wanted.

Johnson, 47, was in tears when he retired on live TV in April 2021, after finishing third in a race at Newton Abbot.

His amazing career saw him crowned champion jockey four times in a row from 2016 and win the Gold Cup twice.

But he has branched out into ownership since hanging up his whip – and that includes spending big at the sales.

Commenting on his latest purchase, Johnson said: “Everyone wants winners at Cheltenham and that is where we want to get.

“This looks a lovely horse, and will be one for the future, he is a proper long-term three-mile chaser and it might take him two years for him to reach his potential.

“We loved the horse, he’s got the form in the book and we thought he was right for the owner.

“I was hoping we’d get him for £150,000! You never want to spend more than you have to.

“But he was always going to be an expensive horse. He ticks a lot of boxes and was never going to be cheap.”

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THOMAS BARR announced his retirement from athletics after a decorated career filled with “magic memories”.

Barr, 32, represented Team Ireland at three Olympic Games, culminating at Paris 2024.

Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile

@TomBarr247

It was Barr’s third Games, compared to McGrory’s first[/caption]

@kellymcg24

Kelly often shares cute snaps of them together[/caption]

Instagram/tombarr247

With their dog ‘Buddy’ who passed away last February[/caption]

In an emotional retirement statement released on Wednesday, the Waterford man insisted he had “cherished every moment”.

The magic memories made in France were made alongside his partner Kelly McGrory, who was making her Olympics debut.

While Barr largely made his name as a hurdler throughout his lengthy career, he’s now associated with last year’s mixed relay gold medal at the European Championships.

Kelly similarly competes in the 400m hurdles and 400m flat.

Marking their joint-achievement, the 31-year-old Barr shared a sweet photo of them trackside.

He captioned it: “Two tickets to Paris please! What an absolute honour it is to be selected for my 3rd Olympics alongside my better half for her 1st!!!

“There is no greater sporting honour than representing Ireland at an Olympic Games and the journey to get there is never easy, but worth it.”

The Waterford man and his Donegal girlfriend have spoken in the past about how much of a benefit it is to their relationship that they understand each other’s trials and tribulations as elite athletes.

In 2022 McGrory told Donegal Live: “It’s cool that both of us are in the same sport.

“There is a good understanding with each other about what’s needed.

“We set the bar high for each other. We’re in the same training group and more or less do the same training.

“When we’re into season, everyone’s programme is tailored depending on when the person is trying to peak.

“Thomas is off to the Worlds now and he was tapering at different times, but it’s great that we’re in the same group.”

Barr famously came within .05 seconds of a bronze medal in the 400m hurdles at the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Now a bit of a silver fox, he’s become known for being a guiding figure for Ireland’s prodigious crop of new sprint stars such as Adeleke and Israel Olatunde.

McGrory, 27, has had to display a significant amount of resolve in her career to get this far too.

She’s overcome persistent injury problems to bank a career-best year on the track so far in 2024.

The Tir Chonaill Athletics Club product set a new personal best in Rome at those same European Championships where Barr won gold.

She clocked 57.10 seconds in the 400m hurdles final which ensured she wound up in seventh place in the standings.

Sam Barnes/Sportsfile

Sam Barnes/Sportsfile

DANNY Jones has revealed he’s chosen to “block out” his father completely after winning I’m a Celebrity helped him finally overcome the scars of feeling abandoned as a child.

The McFly star says his jungle victory over Coleen Rooney and Reverend Richard Coles last year held a deeper meaning, enabling him to finally “feel enough” and put to bed the demons that have troubled him for decades. 

Rex

Danny Jones says he finally ‘felt enough’ after winning I’m A Celebrity in December[/caption]

Facebook

Danny says he’s been estranged from his father Alan, pictured with wife Sharon, for decades[/caption]

Instagram

Danny is married to former Miss England Georgia Horsley and has a son Cooper, six[/caption]

Viewers were moved to tears during the series when the Bolton-born musician, 38, said he had “found a dad” in co-star Barry McGuigan, hinting at his long-running rift with his own father, Alan.

Following his parents’ divorce, Danny – who has starred on The Voice and The Masked Singer – admits he has failed to reconnect with his dad, who in a tragic final straw bailed at the last minute when they arranged to reconcile after two decades last year.

The pop icon says he has felt “constantly guilty” for having a happy marriage to former Miss England Georgia Horsley – with whom he shares six-year-old son Cooper – because it’s something his mum Kathy hasn’t had since the split.

In an upcoming chat with The High Performance Podcast, he says he hasn’t had a relationship with Alan since his teen years and when asked if picking up the phone would help, he flatly says: “No.”

Danny, who has now cut off all contact with his dad, continues: “No, because I don’t know him any more. He doesn’t know me and I don’t recognise his voice.

“I didn’t choose to be born, he chose to have me. I could never leave my son and I’d be fighting to speak to him, and yet my dad isn’t. Why should I bother?

“I think it would bring more problems in my life if I had him back in my life, so I have to block it out and say ‘That’s over.'”

Danny’s relationship with Alan became strained after his parents split up, which left him in a “cold, damp, dark house” with his mum, who struggled in the aftermath.

He suspects the tensions first emerged when he challenged his dad, explaining: “I think because I sat down with him and said ‘Can you not just sort it out with mum?’

“Your kids should be your first thought and I didn’t feel like that with my dad – he left us and you’re just abandoned. Like ‘I idolised you and now you’ve just gone’.

Instagram

Danny struggles to understand the relationship with his dad because he dotes on his six-year-old son[/caption]

PA:Press Association

Danny married former Miss England Georgia Horsley in 2014[/caption]

“He had some issues as well. I wish I’d known what I know now to be able to go ‘Dad, talk to me, let’s talk about it’. 

“I was always scared of talking because talking in my house always ended up in conflict and fights.

“I wish I could have gone for a beer or a coffee with my dad and just gone ‘Are you ok, what’s going on, tell me?'”

Brutal rejection

After decades apart, last year Danny agreed to meet his father when he flew over from Spain to attend a pal’s birthday. 

He says he was “buzzing” at the idea of reconciling, only for Alan at the last minute to cancel, stating he would attend the party but not travel to London to see his son.

The star said the last time he spoke to his father other than that, after many years, was in a phone call to say he’d got engaged.

But even then Alan annoyed him by telling Danny how he had been carrying £500 beer barrels up the stairs in his pub, adding that amount of money did not mean much to his celeb son.

The long-standing rift haunted Danny, who believed it was actually winning I’m A Celebrity – alongside “various therapy, for different reasons” – that finally cleansed him of his difficult emotions and feelings of abandonment.

He says things came to an emotional head when talking to the ITV show’s welfare team as he sat with the crown on his head, “stinking” and starving after losing six kilos. 

I felt guilty for cuddling at night – I was like ‘my mum’s not got anyone’. I wasn’t living my life because I felt so much pain for my mum. It was hurting me too much

Danny Jones

Danny recalls: “She said ‘How are you?’ And it was just me and this therapist. I was like ‘I think I’m on top of the world, I think I’m alright’. 

“And I hadn’t really connected with anybody in the outside world by this point…

“I’ve just been on a show where someone’s voting for me, but not just me, but me when I’m hungry, when I’m tired, when I’m covered in stuff that I don’t want to be covered in. 

“It’s the worst of me. And she just said to me ‘So do you feel enough?’ And I just burst out into tears. It’s like ‘Oh my God, maybe I am’.

“That was like one moment where I was like ‘Woah, I have never felt that emotion’. I’ve never asked that to myself or been asked that. 

“So for me that was like one of the most rewarding moments I think I’ve ever had in my life, because yeah I think I am.”

Getty

Danny felt sorry for mum Kathy (right) because she didn’t have a happy relationship[/caption]

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Young Danny was ‘abandoned’ by his dad and says they have had two calls in 20 years[/caption]

While Danny is grateful to have moved past the pain of his childhood, he can see how the trauma bled into his own relationship with his stunning wife Georgia Horsley. 

He met her at a Miss London event in 2008, while she was the reigning Miss England, and he credits her with having helped him battle anxiety and panic attacks that plagued him from the age of 19.

Danny believes a lot of his struggles stem from “all the loss” – including his dad’s abandonment, the death of his grandparents, which led him to suffer “night terrors”, and the death of his “best, best mate more recently”.

And at times, the McFly frontman – who married Georgia in 2014 – was crippled with “guilt” over having such a great relationship. 

He explains: “I felt guilty for cuddling at night – I was like ‘my mum’s not got anyone’. I wasn’t living my life because I felt so much pain for my mum. It was hurting me too much.”

‘Like a tornado’

Recalling his childhood, Danny reflects: “For me, my parents are like your first idols.

“Getting in a band and coming back to a house that wasn’t home any more – that had happy memories – I was healing from that and I was catching up from there.

“There was this song called ‘Last Mistake’ – that’s actually never been released – about the very first time I went home and I saw this house that used to be a home and I was explaining how cold it was and dark.

“I didn’t want to go home and go to this dark place where my mum was in bits over this divorce. Seeing my mum like that it wasn’t very nice.

“From what I thought was an amazing perfect family home to this destruction and this cold, damp, dark house – I didn’t want to be there. It was like a tornado, getting bigger and bigger.

“My dad used to do the little things like the DIY, and like the curtains were falling down or the shelf was hanging down. 

“I was like ‘My mum’s here on her own’. I used to feel guilty for having a good relationship because my mum didn’t have one.”

Thankfully Danny seems to have moved past those problems, describing himself as being in a “good place”, thanks to behaviours including going to the gym, getting good sleep, visualising and “mouth taping”.

Getty - Contributor

Danny credits wife Georgia as well as various therapies and winning I’m A Celeb with leaving him in a better place mentally[/caption]

The latter is a technique that forces people to breathe through their nose while sleeping, which is favoured by the likes of footballers including Erling Haaland. 

Danny also follows an 80/20 diet plan, which comprises 80 per cent being good, 20 per cent bad, meaning he’s strict during the week and can “enjoy yourself at the weekends”.

Reflecting on his journey to happiness he says: “It was healing and I’ve learned something about myself – that I still need to heal. I clearly have something that is still hurting.

“I think I’m healing from a lot of things. I’ve had various therapy for different reasons, but I’m trying to find another one now.”

Previously, when Danny was on I’m A Celebrity, Alan said he believed their falling out was due to his son siding with his mum in the divorce.

He told the Daily Mail: “I think because he loves his mum so much he’s protected her, and I think any reunion with me, and this is only my opinion, would upset his mum. I don’t think he wants to do that and I understand that.

Prior to this recent interview, Alan claimed he wanted to reach out again to Danny to try to make amends.

He said: “At the end of the day I can sleep at night, I know he’s okay, he’s safe…

“But I would like to think if anything bad happened, like an accident or something, that someone would message me to let me know, and I don’t know if that would happen…

“But hopefully one day we’ll have that pint, sooner rather than later, time’s getting on.”

Danny Jones speaks on The High Performance Podcast, which airs tomorrow, visit: www.thehighperformancepodcast.com.

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