"Let's be clear about this, a good sense of cynicism now exists among the membership of this movement who see our leadership and prisoners being treated with contempt by the Free-State Government, elements of which are shamelessly using Dessie as a hostage. This puts them in serious default of their responsibilities and obligations. Northern Nationalists and Republicans watch and do not cry foul as some of the most vicious pro British loyalists, who have literally cut people into small pieces for no other reason other than religion, walk the streets. This is because they recognise this as part of the process that may one day lead to peace on this island. They see it as worth the risk if peace is the prize.

"Risks must be taken and courage must be shown if the process is to work and it must work for everyone not just a few or those deemed to be acceptable to the PDs. The case of Dessie O'Hare and those imprisoned for the killing of Garda during the late war encapsulates this, if it's over it's over, you can't cherry pick who you let out and who you keep in.

"Therefore our bottom line is this, our engagement in this process is at risk, and we're not trying to play games here, but, we have serious doubts about the motives and actions of some segments of the Free State Government. Is Bertie and the rest of the Government dog being wagged by the PD tail?

"Either this government is serious and genuine about this process, and proves it, or we step back."

In an addendum to this, another IRSP Ard Comhairle member Terry Harkin condemned the response of some members of the media in turning this into a 'cease fire only issue'. Speaking from Belfast, Harkin said:

"The fact that some segments of the press are becoming hung up on the implications to the INLA cease-fire of the O'Hare case is symptomatic of what is going wrong in the entire process. Scare mongering is replacing good old fashioned investigative journalism.

"The PDs have long been involved in an unholy trinity with Garda Special Branch and certain elements of the tabloid, and other gutter, press to tip off the British Government to developments in the south of the island in pursuance of their own political ends. For the last few years they have in effect been the eyes and ears of the British regimes in Downing Street and have continually undermined the concept that Ireland is a sovereign nation and just as continually retarded the process. Now they are attempting to use Dessie O'Hare as a hostage to bolster up their flagging support in the run up to the next southern election.

"The Irish Republican Socialist Movement have historically seen the likes of the PDs before. They sold flour at inflated prices during the famine, they supported the likes of Martin Murphy during the Great Lock-Out, they jeered the Citizen Army and Volunteers on their way to execution, they wear their British poppies with pride every November (with Bertie's son-in-law) and now they hope to hold what is left of the 'Peace Process' to ransom.

"Let journalists investigate that and not be falling into the pit dug for them by the PDs, we have an inclusive process or we don't have an inclusive process. That is the issue, and I for one hope that the PDs disappear up their own right wing rhetoric before they pull what's left of the one we've got down around all our ears."

STATEMENTS ENDS