From: "Stasi" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Peoples War] Ireland: Murder Weapon Linked To LVF - BBC Tuesday, 2 October, 2001, 21:22 GMT 22:22 UK RealPLayer Video Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/1575000/video/_1575677_rosie_vi.ram Murder weapon linked to LVF ===================== http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/northern_ireland/newsid_1575000/1575594. stm Mr O'Hagan was shot yards from his Lurgan home The weapon used to murder Northern Ireland journalist Martin O'Hagan is understood to have been linked to a previous shooting by the Loyalist Volunteer Force. RUC chief constable Sir Ronnie Flanagan has said that police inquiries into the killing are concentrating on the loyalist splinter group. It is understood that the police have established that the same gun was used in the killing of Grahame Marks, 37, at his home in Tandragee earlier this year. Mr Marks was alone in a house in the Protestant Tullyhugh Estate, in Tandragee on 11 April, when a gunman forced his way in and shot him several times. It is understood he was shot in the head and died at the scene. The LVF were suspected of carrying out that shooting. Mr O'Hagan, a 51-year-old father-of-three, was shot dead close to his Lurgan home as he walked home from his local pub on Friday night. In a call to a Belfast newsroom, the Red Hand Defenders said it carried out the murder. This is a cover name used in the past by both the LVF and the Ulster Defence Association. In a BBC interview on Monday, Sir Ronnie Flanagan said: "At this stage local involvement by the LVF is a very firm line of inquiry that we are pursuing." Sir Ronnie added that he had given Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid a briefing on police inquiries into the murder and he said the government was keeping the LVF ceasefire "under almost hourly review". Several thousand people attended Mr O'Hagan's funeral on Monday afternoon with both Protestant and Catholic clergymen offering prayers. Among the mourners were representatives of the Northern Ireland Office, senior police officers, trade union figures and many journalists. Bosses Mr O'Hagan worked in the Belfast office of the Dublin-based Sunday World, where he built a reputation covering paramilitary and drugs-related stories. The former northern editor of the Sunday World, Jim Campbell, who himself survived a loyalist murder attempt in 1984, helped carry Mr O'Hagan's coffin. He infuriated County Armagh paramilitary bosses, including murdered LVF leader Billy Wright, by exposing their crime and drugs rackets. Mr O'Hagan had recently been working on a number of stories involving LVF members. The murder came at a time when the government has the UDA ceasefire under close scrutiny. The Northern Ireland secretary warned on Friday that he would declare the ceasefire over if there was any more UDA-inspired violence, following a week of serious rioting in north Belfast. _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________
