Hold your nerve, Hain tells Sinn Féin

A report into Special Branch officers' involvement with a loyalist paramilitary gang by the North's Police Ombudsman will make uncomfortable reading, Northern Secretary Peter Hain admitted today.

On the eve of the publication of the report on an Ulster Volunteer Force gang riddled with informers which carried out murders from its North Belfast powerbase, Mr Hain urged Sinn Féin and republicans to hold their nerve as they considered endorsing the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) for the first time in their history.