PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde has condemned the IRA's "grip of fear" over the community which was stopping people coming forward over the murder of Belfast man Robert McCartney.
A man who was being questioned by police in connection with the murder of Mr McCartney was freed without charge last night. The 29-year-old man, understood to be from the Short Strand area, handed himself over to the PSNI yesterday. He was questioned for several hours before being released.
He is not one of the three men expelled by the IRA over the murder of Mr Cartney (33), who was beaten and stabbed to death by a mob outside a Belfast pub last month. A man who was arrested on Saturday in connection with the killing was also released without charge.
Mr Orde told BBC Radio 4's Todayprogramme this morning 70 people were in the bar where he was killed. But the police were unable to get the evidence they needed because people feared the IRA.
The police chief said the Provisional IRA was carrying out crimes to fund illegal activity and was prepared to allow its members to commit murder without sanction.
Mr Orde also he was "99.9 per cent positive" that the IRA was behind the Belfast bank raid.
Sinn Féin has said the police chief had no evidence to back his claim the IRA was responsible for the £26.5 million Northern Bank robbery. Mr Orde said he was certain it was involved. "If we had evidence we would have people in front of the courts," he said. "No chief constable gives out publicly the intelligence they have ... I would not have said what I said without being 99.9 recurring per cent positive that crime was committed by the IRA."
Mr Orde also renewed his call for Sinn Féin to join the Northern Ireland police board. "The notion we don't speak to Sinn Féin frankly is rubbish," he said. "Sinn Féin speak to us behind the scenes. They are just incapable of speaking to us up front and engaging in policing through the democratic procedures that are in place in Northern Ireland."
Mr McCartney's sister Paula also repeated her demand for the IRA to order people to come forward over the murder.
"The IRA has to accept that their members did indeed carry it out and some of those members are still in their organisation," she said.
"Therefore the responsibility of what happens now to these members lies with the IRA. They have expelled three members. But there were more than three people involved. Therefore people who participated in the clean-up are still their members. So in that case then surely they have the power to order them to do the right thing."
Belfast City Council last night overwhelmingly backed an SDLP motion condemning the murder and calling on witnesses to pass on information to the police.
Sinn Féin abstained during the vote after their amendment calling on people to come forward through whatever avenue they chose was heavily defeated.
Catherine McCartney said yesterday members of the family were now considering travelling to Washington to engage the support of US politicians and Irish-American figures for their "Justice for Robert" campaign.