{"id":520316,"date":"2026-06-26T23:17:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T23:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/520316\/"},"modified":"2026-06-26T23:17:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T23:17:08","slug":"veronica-guerins-too-brief-life-changed-ireland-for-the-better-taoiseach-tells-anniversary-event-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/520316\/","title":{"rendered":"Veronica Guerin\u2019s \u2018too brief life\u2019 changed Ireland for the better, Taoiseach tells anniversary event \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin<\/a> has said the late journalist Veronica Guerin<\/a> should never be remembered as a \u201ctragic figure\u201d but as \u201ca vibrant, exuberant young woman\u201d. <\/p>\n

Speaking at the Truth and Transparency event in Dublin on Friday, Martin said the journalist murdered by gangland criminals<\/a> on June 26th, 1996 was a \u201cforce of nature who touched the lives of many people and in her far too brief life changed her country and made it better\u201d.<\/p>\n

He recalled how they had become friends when they were both in \u00d3gra Fianna F\u00e1il. He said she could have had a career in politics or political journalism but she had been \u201ctoo original to follow an expected route [and] her route to journalism was far from standard\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cShe did not go through the normal routes of a relevant degree followed by a training place and rising through the ranks. She was rapidly seen by everyone as a person driven to tell stories which others couldn\u2019t,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Martin highlighted how she \u201cwanted to go deep into parts of Irish society which had a huge impact on communities\u201d and went after gangland criminals and \u201cparamilitary bosses because she was determined to expose them and to show their victims that they were heard\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said she had \u201cgathered information on some of the darkest reaches of society and brought them to light with some of the most-read Irish journalism of the 20th century\u201d.<\/p>\n

In his speech at the Convention Centre Dublin, Martin said Guerin\u2019s murder ultimately led to the establishment of the Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reaction from the Irish people was as close to full national unity as it is possible to have,\u201d he said. \u201cFury that something like this could happen quickly became more focused on a determination that a new response to criminals had to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Taoiseach noted that \u201cprofessional journalism is under real pressure\u201d with the spread of unreliable news and \u201cincreasingly intolerant and authoritarian governments happy to undermine independent journalism\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said he was \u201cdetermined\u201d that would not happen in Ireland but added that it was \u201cthe job of journalists to persuade the public of the worth of their work and it is on this that their success will be determined. But equally it is clear that there needs to be foundational support to enable the profession to do the work which would otherwise be ignored by the instant-hit online mentality.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin has said the late journalist Veronica Guerin should never be remembered as a \u201ctragic figure\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":520317,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,1843,43,70423],"class_list":["post-520316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-micheal-martin","tag-news","tag-veronica-guerin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=520316"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520316\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/520317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=520316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=520316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=520316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}