Former MEP Martina Anderson had abortion for IRA mission

Her autobiography Choosing the Struggle, was published this week.

She was 22-years-old in 1985 when she was on the run in the Republic of Ireland but was preparing to join an IRA unit operating in England.

The Derry woman says she discovered she was pregnant weeks into the planning a bomb attack.

"I never thought I'd write a book," she said on RTE One's Miriam.

"When I reflected on it, I was going to write with honestly.

"Women like me who had an unplanned pregnancy, because of the circumstances I found myself in, I put the struggle first, I had an abortion, the hardest and most painful decision of my life."

She confessed “was not for letting my comrades down”.

"I went away in silence and returned in silence and lived in silence for over 40 years.

"I do believe in the telling of the story that it make some small contribution to stopping the moral and social shaming of women like me. It would've been easier to stay silent and people will judge me.

"I respect people's faith position on this, I'm not looking to convert anyone, or for forgiveness or approval."

Most of her family did not know, she added, but says compassion and faith are not opposites.

Now 64, Anderson also details how a surgery during her time in prison robbed her of the chance to have children. A gynaecologist inmates nicknamed 'Dr Death' removed her womb during an operation to treat polyps.

First arrested at 16, Anderson says the people of the north were "abandoned" and learned to live under "brutality".

Anderson has been a stalwart in republican politics for decades after she was arrested in 1986.

She was convicted of conspiring to cause explosions and sentenced to life in prison. She was released 13 years later as a condition of the Good Friday Agreement and went into politics serving as an MLA and MEP.

The former Foyle MLA, who was ordered to stand aside from her seat by the Sinn Féin leadership in 2021 amid tensions about the Derry chapter of the party.