Northern Ireland's top-security Maze prison will be virtually empty over the holiday period after every convicted paramilitary inmate was paroled for Christmas.
A total of 128 Provisional IRA, INLA and loyalist inmates walked out the gates yesterday to be met by relatives and friends. They will have 12 days to spend with their families before returning.
When they get back none should have long to wait until they are freed permanently. Under the terms of the Belfast Agreement, they will be released by May provided their various organisations maintain their ceasefires.
Two Loyalist Volunteer Force inmates who are on remand will remain in the Maze over Christmas. Only sentenced prisoners are eligible for parole. A skeleton staff of 50 prison officers will be on duty in the jail during the holidays.
From early morning, the prisoners were released in batches to ensure there was no confrontation between rival groups. One of the first out was Sean Kelly, the Provisional IRA bomber who killed nine people in a Shankill Road fish shop in 1993.
He was hugged at the gates by a woman and bundled into the back of a car.
UDA prisoner Michael Stone, jailed for the 1989 gun and grenade attack which killed three mourners at a republican funeral, was greeted by supporters who shouted: "Michael is our hero." He was driven away in a blue BMW.
One of the last to leave was James McArdle, serving 25 years for the Docklands bomb which ended the IRA ceasefire in 1996. He was accompanied by three men from south Armagh involved in the sniper killing of Lance-Bombardier Stephen Restorick, the last British soldier to be shot in the North.
None of the prisoners made any comment to waiting journalists. They carried their belongings in brown paper sacks and cardboard boxes. Some left the jail carrying caged budgies and canaries they had kept in their cells.
The two LVF prisoners who were refused release, Mr Robin King (33) and Mr Ralph Philip (35), had applied to Lord Justice Campbell in the High Court for compassionate bail on the grounds that other prisoners have been granted Christmas parole until January 4th by the Northern Secretary, Mr Peter Mandelson.
But the judge told the pair, awaiting trial for the Maze prison murder of Poyntzpass murder suspect Mr David Keyes in March last year: "I regret to say that is not a consideration the court can take into account."
Lord Justice Campbell added that he could "only deal with matters of a legal basis" and, as such, theirs was not a case for bail.
At the same time in the Crown Court, three other LVF inmates, one awaiting sentence for his part in the actual murders of the Poyntzpass friends, Philip Allen and Damien Trainor, and his two co-accused, still awaiting judgment, were each freed on £2,500 bail over the Christmas period.
Mr Justice Kerr said initially that those involved in murder, particularly involvement "in two of the most heinous murders in the history of Northern Ireland", such as the Poyntzpass killings, would never be considered for bail.
But he was prepared to take "a wholly exceptional course" because of a "combination of exceptional circumstances", including the decision by the Secretary of State to release prisoners on Christmas parole.
In the case of Ryan Robley (30), from Highfield Gardens, Banbridge, awaiting sentence for his role in the two murders, Mr Justice Kerr said had he been sentenced to life he would have also been eligible for release under the terms of the Belfast Agreement.
Meanwhile, Ms Marion Price of the Irish Republican Prisoners' Welfare Association condemned the decision by the authorities not to grant parole to Martin Duffy, an "Oglaigh na hEireann" inmate from Maghaberry prison.
"Martin Duffy is due to be released in May," she said. "It is completely unprecedented for a prisoner in such circumstances not to be granted holiday parole. The British government is vindictively punishing this man because he opposes the Belfast Agreement."
Ulster Unionist security spokesman Mr Ken Maginnis said that while prisoner release was hard to swallow it was worth it if it contributed to permanent peace.
"At the end of the day it is the price we have to pay. This is a small element we have to live with. I'm glad I'm not walking behind coffins and long may that last. We want to ensure that is a permanent state of affairs."
The releases were welcomed by the Irish Republican Socialist Party, the INLA's political wing.