IRA Gunman fires shots over INLA man's coffin
18 April 2012
Statement by TUV Leader Jim Allister:"Today's report in the Irish News (p 10) on the funeral of Seamus Coyle yesterday in Londonderry raises at least two interesting questions, the political inconvenience of which means they will probably go unanswered.
1. How was it possible for an open display of paramilitarism, including the firing of shots from a rifle, to go unchallenged by the police, given their means of knowledge that such a funeral was intended?
2. Where does the revelation that the gunman who fired the shots was a member of the IRA, leave the claims that that organisation has been stood down and its weapons decommissioned?
The lawless scenes at this funeral, the inactivity of the police and the reported attendance of Sinn Fein representatives, as well as the central role for an IRA gunman, raise questions which I will now pose to the police and the Justice Minister, but doubtless neither will face up to the issues raised by this paramilitary funeral."
