McGuinness says UDA must prove peace promise
The loyalist Ulster Defence Association must prove its vow to end all criminality and paramilitarism is for real, Martin McGuinness insisted today.
After the UDA ordered its linked paramilitary organisation – the Ulster Freedom Fighters – to stand down from midnight last night, the Stormont Deputy First Minister gave a cautious welcome to the move.
“I am prepared to welcome the comments that were made but I am prepared to welcome it up to a point,” the Sinn Féin MP said.
“The fine words used yesterday have to be matched by deeds or more appropriately by a lack of deeds.
“The UDA needs to recognise the activities of the organisation have been hugely detrimental in terms of the attacks on the Catholic community and also hugely detrimental to the Protestant community.
“This organisation has been involved in drug dealing, in other criminal activities, in racist attacks on newcomers to our community. All that will have to be stopped.
“They need to recognise that we are in a whole new world where the vast majority of the community want to see politics work and want to see political decisions taken which benefit their lives.”
The UDA announced at a Remembrance Day service in the loyalist Sandy Row area of Belfast yesterday that it was standing down all UFF active service units and that it would put its arms beyond use.
However it was not clear how the weapons would be put beyond use.
“The Ulster Defence Association believes that the war is over, and we are now in a new democratic dispensation that will lead to permanent political stability - but we believe the political parties and the political institutions are themselves still in a period of transition,” the terror group’s statement said.
“In that context, the organisation intends to continue through a process of transformation that will ultimately achieve a Northern Ireland based on equality, justice and inclusivity where no sections of our people are left behind regardless of religion, politics or identity.”
