Gardaí on notice: Paramilitary funeral affront
It was contrived to show the brutal criminal as a good republican who was murdered because he tried to defend his community against drug gangs. It was a propaganda fraud from beginning to end.
The truth is that Ryan was as much a criminal as those who had him murdered. His murder allowed his puppet masters to use his funeral to try to aggrandise their immoral, pathetic cause — the dangerous fantasy described as dissident republicanism.
Gardaí were, as they admitted, unable to intervene in that sham because they had not expected such a provocative display — one preceded, incredibly, by a ring of “republican” road blocks in a suburb of our capital.
Alan Ryan’s younger brother Vincent, 25, was murdered earlier this week in Finglas. The authorities have been forewarned and must intervene to prevent any recurrence of the evil bravado that went unchallenged four years ago.