Divers search for top loyalist

Police divers were today searching a Belfast reservoir after a top loyalist from the city disappeared.

The man who disappeared from his north Belfast home earlier this week is believed to be a close associate of the deposed Ulster Defence Association leader Johnny “Mad Dog” Adair.

Special diving teams and regular officers were trawling the waterworks area as their hunt for the missing man intensified.

A number of people had been arrested and were being questioned by detectives about serious crimes in the Belfast area, a police spokeswoman added.

The missing man has not been seen since he left his home in the north of the city on Wednesday.

It is understood he had links to Adair, who was returned to jail earlier this year at the height of a violent internal loyalist paramilitary feud.