IRA has strong links with British gangs, expert claims

THE IRA has forged an alliance with a network of criminal gangs in Britain in a multi-million euro cigarette and fuel smuggling racket, a former head of the Special Branch in Belfast claimed yesterday.

Bill Lowry told BBC Radio 4’s File On Four last night okthat links were built by senior Provisional IRA members with British gangsters while they spent time in high-security jails.

The programme reported allegations that the IRA was involved in the laundering of hundreds of millions of pounds, some of which was reinvested in elaborate schemes to bring illicit fuel and tobacco into Britain.

Northern Ireland Security Minister Ian Pearson told the programme the IRA was now “perhaps the most sophisticated organised criminal grouping to be found anywhere in Europe, possibly the world.” The report comes as the IRA is under increasing pressure over its alleged involvement in criminal activity, from the 37.4 million Northern Bank raid in Belfast to money-laundering in the South and the murder of Robert McCartney.

File On Four quoted police and customs’ on both sides of the Border as saying the Provisionals are involved in a “significant percentage” of cigarette and fuel smuggling in Britain, much of it originating in south Armagh. They use some of Britain’s top criminal gangs as a distribution network for tobacco it was claimed. They use expert techniques to launder fuel on an industrial scale, removing the marker dyes from low-tax diesel intended for agricultural or central heating use to allow it to be used illicitly by road vehicles.

Customs last month intercepted fuel tankers bound for Liverpool from Dublin which had been disguised as trailers carrying timber to conceal their illicit cargo, the programme said. It is thought almost five million litres of laundered fuel are being sent across the Irish Sea by just one IRA group.

Meanwhile, a bureau de change allegedly controlled by the Provos near the Border had banked £250 million in suspect cash, some of which was used as ‘venture capital’ to fund criminal activities. Paper trails linked the cash to criminals around the world believed to be involved in cigarette smuggling, it was reported.