Sinn Fein Youth is to seek an urgent meeting with the Department of Justice and the Garda to discuss what it claims is regular Garda harassment of the organisation.
Rejecting media reports on the Sinn Fein Youth congress in Dublin at the weekend, and subsequent confrontations with gardai, members of the organisation yesterday told a press conference in Dublin that The Irish Times and the Evening Herald had given an "unfortunate misrepresentation" of events.
Mr Eoin O Broin, the national organiser, said Sinn Fein Youth had "a constant problem with Garda Special Branch harassing and intimidating our youth activists". They were continually stopped and searched and had "home visits" from gardai, a situation that did not apply to other youth organisations, he said.
Mr O Broin described as "lies" newspaper reports that members of the youth wing of Sinn Fein, who were attending their first national congress in Dublin at the weekend, had rocked a Garda car with gardai sitting inside. However, he confirmed that a group of young people had surrounded the unmarked car.
From 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday gardai had stayed outside the venue in an unmarked car.
"In order to highlight our concerns and challenge such harassment, Sinn Fein Youth staged an impromptu protest outside our national congress.
"A group of young people surrounded the unmarked car and chanted for an end to Garda harassment. At several points gardai accelerated the car, attempting to drive into the crowd, endangering the protesters," he added. The car was "held back by youth activists in order to ensure the safety of others", and this was "the only contact made with the car", Mr O Broin said.
Referring to an incident on Saturday night in O'Connell Street, in which eight arrests were made, he said that a group of Sinn Fein Youth activists were "attacked" by uniformed gardai.
A third confrontation involving gardai and Sinn Fein Youth took place on Sunday at Store Street Garda station when about 100 participants in an earlier march through the city centre went to protest at the Saturday-night arrests.
Mr Matt Carthy, Dublin organiser, said the organisation wanted senior Sinn Fein figures to take action on their behalf and to raise the matter with the Government.