'Give up weapons or lose funding' theat to UDA

Government funding for the loyalist Ulster Defence Association in the North will cease in 60 days if gunmen do not decommission weapons.

Social development minister Margaret Ritchie linked the move to recent UDA violence in Counties Antrim and Down and said she was not prepared to continue supporting a conflict transformation project without evidence of reduced criminality.

She said: “I abhor paramilitarism of whatever hue. It, and the violence, intimidation and criminality which it almost invariably spawns, have no place in a peaceful modern society.”