Statement by TUV Upper Bann Assembly candidate Roy Ferguson:
“The scale of disorder – with more than 100 petrol bombs being thrown at police – is deeply worrying and reveals the difficulty which there is with outright lawlessness in Republican parts of Lurgan.
“These were the tactics employed for years by the PIRA. Was the gun which was used to fire at the police one of those supposedly decommissioned?
“The Government assessment of paramilitaries last October reminded us that the IRA retain weapons which were never decommissioned and that some of them co-operate with the so-called dissidents.
“Doubtless the glorification of terrorism in the past which we will witness in the in coming months as we approach the centenary of the Easter Rising will only serve to provide justification and indeed inspiration for those who engaged in such violence.”