Loyalist Guns In Focus As Peace Broker Remembered

As leading loyalist figures joined mourners at the funeral of a 'peace-broker' clergyman yesterday, the focus of attention was again turning to weapons' decommissioning.

The Rev Roy Magee, who was buried on Wednesday, was a key figure in helping to broker the loyalist paramilitary ceasefires in the mid-1990s.

The final part of the work he started - the removal of illegal loyalist weaponry - was very much in the minds of those in attendance, as pressure mounted to get rid of their weapons' caches.

Among the hundreds who paid their last respects at Dundonald Presbyterian Church was a figure credited as being prominent in the UDA, Jackie McDonald, as well as the organisation's political spokesman, the UPRG's Frankie Gallagher.

Last month opposition MPs on a Westminster committee indicated they wouldn't back a NIO-sponsored move to renew legislation which continues to allow a weapons decommissioning body to function.

They are against a proposed additional 12-month extension to the work of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning, which was established by a treaty between the British and Irish governments in September 1997.

This was because of the failure of most loyalist paramilitaries, primarily the UDA and UVF, to give up their weapons - or make any measurable effort to make progress.

It is expected a compromise proposal, allowing just six months for significant progress to be made, will win support instead.

In a speech in May, Shaun Woodward issued a warning to the UDA and UVF that the structures governing decommissioning were "time limited".

(BMcC/JM)