Former IRA member reveals ministers’ role in arms plot

AN IRA member has broken his silence to confirm that Irish government ministers organised the delivery of large amounts of weaponry to republicans at the outbreak of the Troubles.

Former leading Official IRA member Bobby McKnight, 71, breaks his 40-year silence in a new book on the organisation published today.

Belfast man McKnight, who in 1969 was a member of the IRA command staff, states that along with another man he drove to Dublin Airport in September 1969. There he met then minister for finance Charles Haughey’s brother, Jock, and took delivery of several cases of weaponry, which filled his pickup truck, these were then transported to IRA members in Dublin.