The funeral of Mr Tony Higgins, the Galway man who was murdered in Saudi Arabia earlier this month, takes place in his native city today.
Mr Higgins's family had to endure a three-week wait for the return of his body following the murder in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, on August 3rd.
The body of Mr Higgins (59) was flown into Shannon late on Sunday and his remains were removed last night from O'Flaherty's funeral parlour to the Sacred Heart church in the city.
Mr Higgins is due to be buried following Requiem Mass at 11 a.m.
Almost two weeks ago, a group calling itself "al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula" claimed to have shot the engineer in his Riyadh office on August 3rd. Mr Higgins had worked in Riyadh for over 20 years, but regularly returned to Galway.
The terrorist group said they had shot the Galway man as part of their "struggle to liberate the Kingdom" and the admission caused further unease among the estimated 1,400 Irish people living in Saudi Arabia.
Initially, local police and intelligence sources blamed the murder on local criminals rather than a terrorist organisation.
In the days after the murder, the American Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) also appeared to believe that criminals rather than terrorists were responsible, as al-Qaeda did not admit carrying out the murder in its immediate aftermath.
Mr Higgins was the second Irishman to be killed in the Saudi capital in the space of two months, following the murder of a BBC television cameraman, Mr Simon Cumbers, from Navan, on June 6th.