Articles in the Clones News Category

“We will never know if these measures may have prevented another tragedy like in Paris, but it’s better to be safe than sorry,” Clones journalist Cliona Connolly told The Northern Standard this week in a vivid eyewitness account of the security alert that has gripped Brussels in the wake of last week’s terror attacks in the French capital. Former Northern Sound reporter Cliona, who is now Irish press officer with the European People’s Party, resides in the Belgian capital city, which is one of the major administrative centres for the ...

By Cianna McNally The iconic multi-million euro Clones sports complex The Peace Link won two prestigious national awards in the space of two days last week. The facility, which only opened in September last year, represented Monaghan County Council at the Chambers Ireland Excellence in Local Government Awards last Thursday night, 12th November, and was selected as the winner under the heading of Supporting Active Communities. The Peace Link faced competition from three other local authorities that were also shortlisted in this category, Leitrim Co Council, South Dublin Co Council and Limerick City ...

By Cianna McNally For the second time this year, a group of Clones secondary school students scooped a national award for a project they undertook that aimed to combat homophobia and homophobic bullying and to promote acceptance and understanding of the LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender) community. The Largy College YSI Group of 2014 – 2015 won the top prize in the Young People in the Community Initiative Category at the annual IPB Co-operation Ireland Pride of Place Awards, which were announced last Saturday night at a glittering gala event in Ennis, ...

By Cianna McNally “It is the place where I meet my friends, where I get to try new activities and experiences, where I set my goals and where I get support to achieve them.” These were the words of Brid Connolly as she described how she benefited from the services offered by the Cairde Activation Centre, Clones. Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Heather Humphreys visited the centre last week and was warmly welcomed by staff and members alike. Each speaker was introduced by Walter Pringle who very capably and enthuasiastically acted as ...

By Cianna McNally For the second year in a row, a Monaghan student has taken the top prize at the national SciFest competition. Louis Madden, who is a fifth year student in Largy College, Clones, and son of Irene Dunwoody and Paul Madden, wowed the judges on Friday last with his project ‘Bringing Genetics to the Masses, The Next Step in Genetic Research,’ which was based upon successfully conducting genetic testing using apparatus he built himself. Such commercially available equipment normally costs in the region of €10,000 to €20,000 but Louis impressively ...

By Cianna McNally  THE fourteenth Clones Film Festival, which took place last weekend saw three venues screening an exceptional programme of films to very appreciative audiences. The annual event kicked off in style last Thursday evening and drew a capacity crowd to the courthouse building in Clones. Three entertaining short films were shown on the night – The Picnic, Boogaloo and Graham amd Love is a Sting. The first two have a particularly strong local connection as bittersweet 1970s period drama The Picnic stars Chiara Vennitilli, an emerging young actress from Redhills, Co ...

By Michael McDonnell A 55-YEAR-OLD woman killed in a two-vehicle crash on the Monaghan–Clones road at 7.50am yesterday morning has been named as Maria Fatima Soares, a Portuguese lady who was living in Roslea, Co Fermanagh. The fatal accident was one of four incidents that took place in much the same area along the N54 in just over 26 hours, including one that occurred only 15 minutes later, in which a woman in her 20s was injured when the car she was driving collided with a lorry. The lady involved in the fatal ...

THERE was great excitement in Clones last Saturday as the children who make up the Beaver unit in 1st Monaghan Clones Scout Group put birdhouses they had designed and painted on display in Barry McGuigan Park and the play park in Cara Street. The Beaver section involves children aged between six and eight and at the start of this season’s activities Beaver Leaders decided that the young Beavers would work on a number of new activities like First Aid and Build a Birdhouse. The children were very excited about this and with ...

PETER HUGHES A rallying cry of “Monaghan beds for Monaghan patients” issued from Monday’s meeting of the Clones-Ballybay Municipal District when a motion tabled by Fianna Fáil councillor Seamus Coyle highlighted the chronic shortage of respite facilities in the county. Colr Coyle sought the intervention of Health Minister Leo Varadkar to address a situation in which he claimed that only nine respite beds were available to cater for the need arising in the entirety of Co Monaghan and a large part of neighbouring Co Cavan. His motion, which won the unanimous support of ...