The following is Jim Allister’s speech during yesterday’s debate in the Assembly:
“The murder by the IRA of Paul Quinn was truly horrific, and it instantly gave rise to totally brazen and disingenuous spinning by Sinn Féin. At the time that that horrific murder occurred, it was, as it still is, politically inconvenient. It is politically inconvenient not only, of course, for Sinn Féin but for the DUP in this House. Immediately it happened, Mr Conor Murphy, who was, if you please, then a Minister, declared that it had nothing to do with republicans and that republicans were not involved in it. He gave that assurance because he said that he had been to see the IRA leadership in south Armagh, which had given him “solid assurances” that republicans were not involved.
“I remind the House that Gerry Adams once told us that he was given solid assurances that the IRA was not involved in the murder of Frank Kerr at Newry post office and that he was given solid assurances that the IRA was not involved in the murder of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe. That is mere whitewash and cover-up as far as Sinn Féin is concerned. A Minister of this House proclaimed that he had been to see the IRA leadership. I do not know whether he went in his chauffeur-driven ministerial car. A Minister of this House having the audacity to state that has been excelled today only by Sinn Féin’s audacity to talk about the motion as the “antithesis of democracy”.
“I will tell you what the antithesis of democracy is. It is a gang of those with death and murder in their hearts and minds luring a 21-year-old to a lonely location and beating him cruelly and relentlessly to death. That is what is the antithesis of democracy. Those who sit on the Sinn Féin Benches are those who seek to whitewash with all their weasel words today.
“This murder is also politically inconvenient for the DUP, which today could muster not a single Front Bench spokesman but only four minutes of contribution about a murder that, as I will remind them, Jeffrey Donaldson was clear about back in 2007. He said that if it was the IRA, the DUP would not sweep it under the carpet. If the IRA was involved in the murder in those circumstances, the DUP would act and would not run away from it. He went on:
“If the IRA is involved — whether it’s individuals or — and there was a gang involved here — if there were a number of IRA members involved in this murder then that’s the actions of the IRA. We are not here to dance around this issue”.
“That party knows that the IRA was involved. What did it do about it? Nothing. That is because this murder was equally politically inconvenient for those who sustained and who still sustain Sinn Féin in government. This debate is politically inconvenient, hence the dearth of contribution from the DUP on this pivotal matter. That is because it goes to the heart of the con that was wrought on the people of Northern Ireland that meant that, suddenly, the IRA and Sinn Féin had signed up to supporting the rule of law, when here we had, within months of the Executive taking office, the IRA still being in the business of murder. Of course it has been swept under the carpet.
“It is quite clear to me that Paul Quinn was sacrificed on the altar of proving that the IRA had supremacy and control in south Armagh. I fear that it is also sadly true that the police investigation and justice have been sacrificed on the altar of the peace process. That is what adds another chilling dimension to this chilling case.”