Ex-IRA men held after vodka hijack

Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell tonight warned trust was being eroded after two former IRA men were arrested with another man following the hijacking of a lorry load of vodka in Co Meath.

The gang ambushed the driver near Dunshaughlin at 11am as the truck, laden with €300,000 worth of drink, made its way from Bailieboro to Dublin.

One of the men being quizzed over the attempted heist was freed under the Good Friday Agreement after serving part of a six-year jail term for possession of explosives.

“The real problem is that it’s very unhelpful to the creation of trust on both sides of the border and in both communities in Northern Ireland,” the minister said.

“As long as the IRA continues to exist, then all of these problems arise. As long as the constitution of the IRA remains treasonable and subversive to the authority of the Irish state, all of these problems continue to arise.”

The hijacking and suspected involvement of former IRA men could have serious implications for the peace process as republicans come under increasing pressure to end criminality.

But Mr McDowell cautioned: “It does depend very much as to whether this (the hijacking) was something done as part of a paramilitary exercise or purely for private gain.”

The arrests come less than a week after a hitman murdered shamed Sinn Féin spy Denis Donaldson at his hill-top farmhouse, an isolated hideout in the wilds of west Donegal.

Donaldson, 56, one of Sinn Féin’s top officials, turned informer more than 20 years ago, betraying some of the party’s top brass as it pushed to the fore in Northern Ireland politics.

Today’s arrests also follow last week’s announcement by British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Taoiseach Bertie Ahern that a deadline had been set for Northern parties to share power in Stormont.

By November the Assembly must be fully up and running or the the London and Dublin governments will pull the plug, implementing a Plan B.

And with the finger of blame pointing squarely at republicans for the Donaldson execution and today’s hijack, Mr McDowell insisted trust was being damaged.

“Obviously I take that crime very seriously. I also have to bear in mind what is being reported to me that some of the participants in the events appear to have been members of the IRA, and that one of them appears to have been released under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement,” Mr McDowell said.

“I don’t want to jump to any further conclusions at this point but this kind of criminality, whoever carries it out, or for whatever reason, is wholly unacceptable.”

And he went on: “Frankly, I’d much prefer to see the IRA wound up or its constitution changed so that it’s no longer an illegal organisation.

“I’d much prefer the provisional movement to say that nobody who carries out actions of this kind can have connections with their movement.”

Gardaí said the three-man gang set up an ambush on a busy stretch of the Delvin to Athboy road hijacking the valuable cargo of vodka.

The container was found around an hour later in the Delvin area of Co Westmeath where the three men were arrested. A 4x4 vehicle was also apprehended by detectives.

It is understood gardaí in Delvin became suspicious following a series of events in the area from early this morning.

The trio are being detained under Section Four of the Criminal Justice Act and are at Mullingar and Longford garda stations. Two of the men, who have strong links to the Provisional IRA, are believed to be from Westmeath and the third man, who is also known to gardaí, is from Co Meath.

The truck driver, who was later found in Co Kildare, was not injured in the hijack. A forensic examination of the container will be carried out by detectives tomorrow.

Further questions will now be asked by unionist politicians and the two governments over whether the IRA has gone out of business. The Independent Monitoring Commission, which assesses paramilitary activity, will also report on the IRA in the coming months.

Security sources have suggested that former associates of a feared IRA assassin killed by the SAS may have murdered Mr Donaldson. Detectives believe the British spy was gunned down to avenge the shooting of Tyrone IRA Jim Lynagh.

Lynagh, 32, was among eight Provisionals ambushed as they tried to blow up a police station at Loughgall in Armagh in May 1987.

But the IRA have denied any involvement in Mr Donaldson’s assassination.

Mr McDowell added that he would rather see an end to the IRA than another denial.