LVF suspected of bar attack
Phoblacht has learned that those involved in the grenade attack on
McNally's bar outside Toomebridge on Monday night of last week came
from the town of Antrim, known for its high level of LVF activity.
Eyewitnesses reported seeing two cars, one a red Nissan and the other
a blue Sierra, joining the M2 at the Antrim onslip. The two cars
drove along the M2, through Toomebridge, until they reached the
Bellaghy turnoff. They then turned back towards Toomebridge stopping
to attack McNally's bar and making their getaway through Toomebridge
towards the town of Antrim.
Phoblacht has also been told that other cars which travelled
through the area around the time of the attack have been contacted by
the RUC who claimed to be ``eliminating them from their enquiries''.
``If the RUC can track down those travelling through Toomebridge at
the time, then why can they not track down those who carried out the
attack and passed through the town after it, passing the barracks?''
asked Sinn Fein Assembly member for the area, John Kelly.
This is not the first time that the RUC in Toomebridge have failed to
catch loyalist death squad members after attacks on Catholics. An
Phoblacht reported on 22 May 1997 that the LVF members who murdered
GAA stalwart Sean Brown also drove past Toomebridge RUC barracks on
their way back to Antrim but the cameras which monitor every vehicle
passing on the main Derry to Belfast Road failed to identify any of
the killers.
trim has long been a hotbed of LVF activity in the area. Local
Catholic residents have been victims of an LVF terror campaign with
shots being fired through the windows of Catholic houses and on the
eve of Billy Wright's funeral the RUC were accused of turning a blind
eye to LVF activity in the area after 15 to 20 armed men set up
roadblocks and fired shots in tribute to him.
Hours before the LVF killing of Ciaran Heffron in Crumlin in April
1998 some of the crowd at a DUP rally in Antrim sported LVF T-shirts.
Also in attendance were known LVF gunmen.
More recently the same LVF members in Antrim have used the cover of
the Orange Volunteers to carry out further attacks in Antrim,
Randalstown, Aldergrove and the recent bomb attacks on the White
Horse Inn in Crumlin and McNally's bar.
Sinn Fein's Martin Meehan said that ``certain parties in the no-camp
have been acting as mouthpieces for loyalist dissidents in the area''.
The attacks, he believes are ``due to the resurgence of Republicanism
in the South Antrim area particularly in the last six months. Since
the Assembly elections Sinn Fein has gone from strength to strength
in the area leading loyalists to attack innocent Catholics because
they feel threatened by our growth''.
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