Official IRA decommissions weapons
A second republican paramilitary group in Northern Ireland announced today that it had decommissioned its weapons.
The so-called Official IRA, a relatively small organisation most active in the 1970s, confirmed it had destroyed its guns.
The declaration was made at a Belfast press conference which came only two hours after a separate republican splinter group, the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), confirmed it had disarmed.
The timing of the separate announcements is thought to be linked to the fact that the legislation which allows illegal groups to decommission weapons without fear of prosecution runs out tomorrow.
