Five years on beleaguered general comes up trumps

FOR three weeks in September, General John de Chastelain and his two colleagues on the international decommissioning body were driven around in a van with blacked-out windows to secret places where vast quantities of IRA arms awaited them.

Yesterday, the Canadian general said he never knew where he was, other than somewhere on the island of Ireland.

Almost two years' ago, in October 2003, General de Chastelain arrived at Hillsborough Castle to brief the press on the IRA's third act of decommissioning.