• In Northern Ireland, individuals can legally possess firearms, including handguns, for personal protection under specific circumstances
Government negotiators have dismissed UVF demands for senior members to be issued with personal protection weapons.
The outlandish request is believed to have been dismissed out of hand as a condition for the terror group to finally transition away from paramilitary activity.
The UVF have been locked in discussions with government negotiators for a number of years and are understood to be nearing a position where they can announce their disbandment.
Early obstacles included demands for immunity from prosecution for historical conflict-related crimes.
The contentious Legacy Act has virtually removed any likelihood of prosecution, even should the Labour government honour its manifesto commitment and repeal the act.
Twenty-seven years after the Good Friday Agreement secured peace, there is no legal framework for decommissioning, leaving negotiators tying to find a verifiable way to show weapons have been put beyond use.
There is an acceptance that any form of decommissioning will only be windrow dressing in any deal to stand down – access to weaponry doesn’t present any difficulty for criminal gangs.
The streets are awash with guns, the sticking point for the UVF are weapons that might have a forensic history linking them to past crimes.
But it’s is their demand for leading paramilitary figures to be allowed to carry personal protection weapons (PPW) that has raised eyebrows.
In Northern Ireland, individuals can legally possess firearms, including handguns, for personal protection under specific circumstances.
The final arbiter is the PSNI who grant firearms certificates for personal protection if there’s a real and immediate risk to the applicant’s life.
Police must be happy a gun is deemed a necessary and proportionate measure.
Applicants must demonstrate a “good reason” and undergo thorough checks, including medical and law enforcement records.
The latter would appear to rule out anyone with a paramilitary history. PPWs were commonplace during the conflict, with public figures including politicians, members of the judiciary and members of the civil service being given a handgun.
There has been precedents with a number of leading paramilitary figures allowed to carry PPWs.
There has been speculation that the UVF was ready to make a declaration as early as this autumn. Optimism was dampened when it emerged they had demanded to be allowed to retain an armed force of around 240 men, in their words, to protect the upper echelons of the terror group.
It is understood they have now modified their demands and scaled them down to a call for a small number of PPWs to be issued which would mean UVF paramilitaries legally carrying guns.
Security sources have said the proposal is a non-starter.
“It would be unthinkable to strike a deal that would legally put guns in the hands of terrorists, they’re gong to have to find a way round that,” one said.
Loyalist sources have said there is anger at the top of the UVF that bargaining positions are finding their way into the public domain.
One source, who has intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the UVF, said only a handful of people from Chief of Staff John ‘Bunter’ Graham down would have any knowledge of the content of discussions with British government representatives.
As previously reported, it is known that a sizeable number of UVF members and sections of the UDA have been negotiating a pathway out of the paramilitaries, but do not represent the entirety of the organisations.
They are believed to be close to agreeing the terms of their transition but their priority in discussions has been to maintain the flow of public money into community-based jobs, many of which are occupied by paramilitary members, and immunity from prosecution for historical crimes.
In February it was announced that the British and Irish governments were to jointly appoint “an Independent Expert to carry out a short scoping and engagement exercise to assess whether there is merit in, and support for, a formal process of engagement to bring about paramilitary group transition to disbandment. This will include examining what could be in scope of such a formal process”.
Lord Alderdice, the former Alliance Party leader who was chair of the Independent Monitoring Commission, said talks about loyalist transition should stop.
“A halt should be called, and you can’t call a halt now sooner than today,” he said. “There comes a point when you have to say no, this hasn’t been delivered.”
It is understood a sticking point in discussions are calls for the UVF to be de-proscribed so that the name can continue to be used legally at memorial and other events.
And also in the naming of veterans clubs, the complication being that those who will continue to use the UVF name as a cover for their involvement in drugs and other crimes.
by Jeffreys_therapist
38 comments
I didn’t realise they couldn’t just take their service weapons home after their shift.
A) The UVF are master negotiators, and should transition their finely honed bargaining skills to high-end property transactions
B) The British government/Civil Servants are inept
C) That loyalist terrorists haven’t decommissioned 27 years after GFA is British policy
D) B + C
Are we still in the 1970’s?
Just throw them in prison where they belong.
Talking bout guns like they ain’t got none, what they think they sold them all?
give the drug dealers their own weapons to protect themselves it’s only fair , without guns the people and business’s they are extorting might be able to fight back.
What fucking decade is it?
Yes a bunch of loyalist terrorists with guns which I’m sure will be all used legally, what could possibly go wrong
Just fucking jail them
These fuckers live in la la land.
Carrying personal protection weapons and de-proscribe the organisation name?
Get to fuck, you bunch of scummy knuckle draggers.
So basically we want everything the exact same (ie same organisation, same name, carrying guns etc,) only difference is we want it all to be totally legal and legitimate now, so that we we shoot the Taigs, we are doing it in the name of loyalist law and order !
Hurray!!
FFS
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
the government have been arming them for years
Them fuckers are laughing away to themselves requesting that, taking the piss out of the government lol
Good on them he could’ve got away with it.. Glad he was refused bail
If them gobshites are allowed one everyone should have one
I needed a laugh today
The amount of times on this sub I have written, “not near wise”, is far too many, but Jesus Christ, they’re not near wise.
It’s time all terrorist organisations are treated as it is with the rest of the world. Which is zero tolerance for anything crime /weapon/drug /gang related. The fact that they are on first name terms with heads of government departments is mind boggling.
How about fuck off and stick them in the clink?
Ah lads
They are talking like they were officially part of the seecurity force here. They are wrong. Jail the fucking lot of them. They NEVER stopped, their drugs are killing people now, their intimidation tactics have caused degredation to many housing areas and their alliances with other criminal elements across the UK and Ireland are well known.
If it was any other terrorist group, the Brits would be absolutely making a show of destroying their capacity to function, but instead here we are, society still very much having to tiptoe around them, lest they break the guns out again. 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
r/nottheonion
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Can’t they just import them to say….. Larne?
If we ask for guns maybe they’ll give us even more money to …
Why is the british government negotiating with them? Is it the amount of collusion blackmail material the UVF have on them or something?
“It is understood they have now modified their demands and scaled them down to a call for a small number of PPWs to be issued which would mean UVF paramilitaries legally carrying guns.”
What a fucking joke of a reality we live in.
Special branch:
Protection from each other?
XD
Terrorist Group asks for guns
Me wondering about all the ones they *allegedly* still have. 🧐
Hold on a paramilitary group is wanting guns for protection lmao thats not suspect at all.
Wait so they where going to arm terrorists
Remember the vitriol directed at Armed Nationalist groups 20 years ago by the media and Unionist Political leaders?
Where are they now? One rule for Nationalists who have largely disarmed and decommissioned weapons, another for these thugs who have no place in modern society.
Why is there crickets (silence) from the media, civil society, political leadership and policing leadership? Is it cowardice, or maybe it is one rule for Nationalists and another for Loyalists. With the Nationalists worse off as usual.
…and a licence to sell drugs, both pharmaceutical and home made?
>It would be unthinkable to strike a deal that would legally put guns in the hands of terrorists.
Yeah… that would never happen, right? I mean can you imagine a scenario where loyalist terrorists were being armed by the British government? It would be insane, would they train them too? Share intel? Crazy, unthinkable stuff that. But then negotiating with terrorists for 27 years is pretty absurd.
They should have asked for a list of people then arrested them all for being a part of a prescribed organisation.
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