Durkan: Denounce loyalist paramilitaries

Unionist leaders in the North tonight came under new pressure to publicly denounce loyalist paramilitaries.

Mark Durkan, leader of the nationalist SDLP party, demanded a clear message from rival politicians that they were not prepared to tolerate the terrorists still waging sectarian campaigns.

He said: “Nationalists and indeed all Catholics want to hear from all unionist politicians a condemnation of loyalist paramilitaries that is unequivocal and as urgent as the demands they make on republican paramilitaries.”

In a speech in Belfast he set out what he wanted to say to unionists, and hear from them, in a bid to restore confidence in Northern Ireland’s battered peace process.

Mr Durkan stressed his party’s continued commitment to the Good Friday Agreement and the power-sharing arrangements suspended following the discovery of a suspected IRA spy-ring at Stormont in October.

But he insisted that nationalists needed to hear the same endorsement from unionists.

The Foyle MLA added that there could be no more excuses.

“No indulging of lies about provocation and retaliation,” he said.

“No underplaying of loyalist paramilitaries relentless sectarian violence against vulnerable innocent Catholics.

“Not just passing criticism of loyalists as a warm up to a real go at republicans.”