SOURCES close to the INLA have said the republican paramilitary group is planning more attacks following its murder of a police officer in Belfast at the weekend.
An INLA gunman shot dead Const Darren Bradshaw (24) at the Parliament Bar in Belfast city centre on Friday night. The RUC described it as a "well thought out and planned operation".
Mr Bradshaw was the first member of the security forces to be killed by the INLA in four years. His parents last night appealed for no retaliation because of his death.
Mr Kevin McQuillian of the Irish Republican Socialist Party, the INLA's political wing, said he did not believe the killing was a "one off". Sinn Fein did not represent "the totality of the republican position" and the IRSP and the INLA were not willing to "allow the republican struggle to be led down a cul de sac".
Mr McQuillian believed another IRA ceasefire could be imminent but his movement had "no time for the bogus peace process". Predicting the likelihood of more violence, he said: "The INLA must be very confident to have killed an RUC man. They wouldn't have committed themselves to such military activity if they weren't likely to sustain it. I imagine there will be more."
The INLA, which describes itself as Marxist, is much smaller than the IRA and is believed to be poorly armed. However, it has been reorganising and recruiting new members since an internal feud last year in which six people were killed including its "chief of staff", Gino Gallagher.
Apart from firing shots at the RUC in west and north Belfast during the Drumcree stand off last summer, the INLA has not attacked the security forces or loyalists since before the IRA ceasefire of August, 1994.
Although Mr Bradshaw's killing must have been planned weeks ago, it is believed the recent murder by loyalists of a Catholic man, Robert Hamill, in Portadown, Co Armagh, could have dictated the timing of the attack.
Mr Bradshaw's murder was condemned by church leaders, the DUP, the SDLP, Alliance and the Workers Party. A Sinn Fein councillor, Mr Alex Maskey, expressed his "regret".