The report: The IRA carried out the £26.5 million robbery of the Northern Bank and senior Sinn Féin members were involved in sanctioning the raid, the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) asserted in its fourth report published yesterday.
The body implicated the IRA and senior unnamed Sinn Féin figures - allegedly also IRA members - in trenchant terms in the pre-Christmas robbery, with the IMC's Government-appointed member, Mr Joe Brosnan, indicating he would resign if the allegations were wrong.
"We have carefully scrutinised all of the material of different kinds that have become available to us since the robbery, which leads us to conclude firmly it was planned and undertaken by the IRA," said fellow member Mr John Grieve, former head of Scotland Yard's anti-terrorism squad.
"We have considered all other hypotheses. We did not jump to conclusions. The material is as strong as anything I have ever seen," said Mr Grieve, former deputy assistant commissioner with the London Metropolitan Police.
The IMC also blamed the IRA for three other major robberies last year: the theft of goods valued over £1 million from the Belfast Makro store in May; the abduction of people and the robbery of goods from the Strabane branch of Iceland in September; and the abduction of people and the robbery of cigarettes valued at more than £2 million from a Belfast bonded store in October.
The IMC recommended, on Assembly pay and allowances, that financial penalties should be imposed by the British government against Sinn Féin. Had the Assembly been sitting, it would have also proposed the suspension of Sinn Féin from the Assembly, it said.
Three of the IMC's four members, Lord Alderdice, former Assembly speaker; Mr Brosnan, former secretary general of the Department of Justice; and Mr Grieve were at the Belfast press conference yesterday. Mr Dick Kerr, former deputy director of the CIA, was absent.
The three members were asked specifically were they, in implicating Sinn Féin, referring to such senior members as Mr Gerry Adams and Mr Martin McGuinness. The three members insisted they would not name names, and would not go beyond the general allegation against Sinn Féin in their report.
Mr Brosnan said it would not be a resigning matter for him if the Northern Secretary, Mr Paul Murphy, did not impose the penalties they proposed. "What would be a resigning matter for me is if this assessment we have made in this very important case turned out to be wrong. That would be a resigning matter for me."
Lord Alderdice said that if the IMC's findings were proved wrong, irrespective of whether anyone was convicted, then that "would of course be a profoundly serious matter".
"I promise you I am not coming to these conclusions on the uncorroborated word of some intelligence agency," said Mr Grieve.
"Do I believe the denial of the Provisional IRA? Absolutely not. That is implicit in what is in here [ in the report]. Quite frankly my position is that the people who have denied it on behalf of the Provisional IRA have got some brass neck," he said.
Mr Grieve in providing a precis of the report said Sinn Féin "must bear its share of responsibility" for the four robberies mentioned in the IMC document.
"Some of its senior members, who are also senior members of the Provisional IRA, were involved in sanctioning the series of robberies," he said. "Although we note Sinn Féin has said it is opposed to criminality of any kind, it appears at times to have its own definition of what constitutes a crime.
"We do not believe the party has sufficiently discharged its responsibility to exert all possible influence to prevent illegal activities on the part of the Provisional IRA," said Mr Grieve.
"If the Northern Ireland Assembly was now sitting we would be recommending the implementation of the full range of measures available, including exclusion from office.
"We are very aware that the imposition of financial penalties is bound to seem paltry against the background of a robbery of £26.5 million. It has also been put to us that if financial penalties are imposed, some people will try to benefit from that by portraying themselves as victims," he said.
"Be that as it may, in the light of the provisions of the legislation, we have decided to recommend that the Secretary of State should consider exercising the powers he has in the absence of the Assembly to implement the measures which are presently applicable, namely the financial ones," said Mr Grieve.
"Finally, the real issue is not the expression of condemnation through the imposition of particular penalties. It is that the ending of all illegal activity by the Provisional IRA and indeed by all other paramilitary groups is fully and permanently addressed."
