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Poliziotti furiosi per i commenti di Martin McGuinness

Officers’ anger at McGuinness’ comments

Martin McGuinness, Sinn FeinTHE body which represents the vast majority of PSNI officers has said that there was anger within the ranks over deputy first minister Martin McGuinness’s interference in a live police investigation.

The Police Federation said that officers objected to Mr McGuinness’s public attack on the PSNI for arresting individuals in Coalisland earlier this week as part of their investigations into the murder of police constable Ronan Kerr.

Mr McGuinness said that he knew that one of the men arrested was “completely innocent”. Taking to the airwaves on Thursday morning, the former IRA commander warned that “innocent people” from nationalist communities “should not be arrested in this fashion”.

Mr McGuinness appeared to take credit for the men’s release, saying that he found it “quite strange that within a very short period of this young man, who was completely innocent, being released after representations by myself, that the other four people who were also arrested were released”.

Ulster Unionist leader Tom Elliott said that he was deeply concerned at Mr McGuinness’s inference that people arrested in a murder investigation were released because he had phoned “someone very, very senior in the PSNI”.

Yesterday Police Federation chairman Terry Spence said that he had received calls from officers expressing anger at this “blatant political interference”.

“Sinn Fein have to understand that the police has to be supported across the board and if they have an issue then correct forum is the Policing Board, not to talk about live investigations,” he said.

However, Mr Spence welcomed the “robust” response to Mr McGuinness’s intervention from chief constable Matt Baggott.

Although using more diplomatic language than Mr Spence, the chief constable made clear to Mr McGuinness that his comments were out of order.

In a statement released by the chief constable on Thursday, he said that his officers’ investigations would continue to be “absolutely methodical and completely free from political influence”. He made clear that the investigation to date had been conducted with “professionalism” and that there had been “progress”.

Meanwhile, two of the men arrested by the PSNI earlier this week have said that they will take legal action over their arrest.

Publican Declan McNally, whose home and business were targeted in dawn raids, told the Irish News that the move had caused “untold damage” to his reputation and the father of Brian Campbell, 23, said he did not know why his son, who was working in the US when Constable Kerr was murdered, was arrested.

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René Querin

Di professione grafico e web designer, sono appassionato di trekking e innamorato dell'Irlanda e della sua storia. Insieme ad Andrea Varacalli ho creato e gestisco Les Enfants Terribles.

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