Demands are being stepped up today for a judicial inquiry into astonishing police claims that the Government and the Catholic Church shielded a priest suspected of orchestrating a bombing outrage in Northern Ireland which killed nine people.

The violence in the North reached its bloody height in 1972 – and even the sleepy village of Claudy was plunged right into the mayhem.

This is the timetable of key events surrounding the Claudy bomb massacre 30 years ago.

The father of a nine-year-old girl killed in the Claudy bombing today called on former Prime Minister Edward Heath and his Defence Secretary Lord Carrington to say what they knew about the atrocity.

The ArchBishop of Armagh and Primate of All-Ireland, Dr Dean Brady, has expressed his personal distress, grief and shame at the possible involvement of a priest, either directly or indirectly, in the Claudy bombing.

Police in the North have launched a review into the investigation of the Claudy bombing in 1972.

Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble has called for a full judicial inquiry, similar to the Bloody Sunday tribunal, into the allegations of a cover-up in the Claudy bombing.

The British Government and the Catholic Church were involved in an astonishing cover-up to shield a priest suspected of heading-up the IRA team responsible for one of Northern Ireland’s worst ever bomb atrocities, police claimed today.

Police in the North are expected to release new information about the IRA's attack on the Co Derry village of Claudy 30 years ago.