The latest group of IRA prisoners to receive early release from Portlaoise Prison includes senior figures close to the Sinn Fein member, Mr Martin McGuinness. The five men, three from Derry and two from north Donegal, were arrested by gardai near St Johnstone in September 1993 while they were preparing to mount a cross-Border gun attack on a British army helicopter.
The five were arrested in possession of a general purpose machine-gun, three assault rifles, binoculars and other equipment. They were all sentenced to six years imprisonment and were not due for release until September next year.
They are Mr Ciaran McFadden, Mr Dermot McFarland and Mr Patrick Villa, from Derry; Mr Michael McLaughlin, from Buncrana, and Mr Paul Rodgers, from Manorcunningham, in Donegal. All are in their 40s.
They were captured by armed detectives and unarmed uniformed officers along with a sixth man, Mr John Donnelly, who has already received early release from Portlaoise on health grounds.
The six are said by Garda sources to have been the main Derry IRA unit and were known as supporters of Mr McGuinness.
Their capture arose from Garda intelligence work. At the time, the Donegal Garda and RUC in Derry had heavily infiltrated the IRA organisation in the north-west through the use of informers.
They were about to be released from Portlaoise on February 8th last year when the IRA re-started its campaign with the bombing at Canary Wharf in London. They had packed their bags and were due to be freed within hours when the bomb exploded and the Government immediately reversed its policy of the early release of IRA prisoners.
It is the police view that the release of the six men will strengthen support in the northwest for Mr McGuinness and, by extension, Sinn Fein's participation in the Stormont talks. Opposition to Sinn Fein's part in the talks is being organised in Donegal and Leitrim by figures associated with the splinter political party, Republican Sinn Fein.
In a statement last night, the Sinn Fein vice-president, Mr Pat Doherty, said: "At our meeting with the Irish Government last Friday, our party president, Gerry Adams, impressed on the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, and on the Minister for Justice, Mr John O'Donoghue, that the issue of political prisoners needed to be urgently addressed.
"The release of these five prisoners is a very welcome development and is an indication of the seriousness with which the Irish Government has approached the peace process in relation to the issue of political prisoners. We are now looking for the British government to display a similar approach and begin the release of al political prisoners immediately."
Prison authorities in the North and in Britain have approved the transfer of two loyalist prisoners. No official details of the prisoners involved were released, but it was confirmed that one prisoner serving a sentence in Scotland will be transferred to a jail in Northern Ireland. Another inmate will be transferred from a prison in England to Scotland.