REPUBLICAN figures in the North called yesterday for an inquiry into the shooting dead of IRA member Diarmuid O'Neill in London on Monday, saying he was unarmed.
The British Prime Minister, Mr John Major, who was briefing Irish journalists in London said that he could not comment in detail on the find and the killing of IRA man.
"We do know there was a huge amount of explosives and it was presumably for the purpose being used." Beyond that, he said, matters were not clear, but after proper investigation and a coroner's hearing on the death of the shot man "then the government can respond".
The Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, yesterday said he understood Mr O'Neill was unarmed when shot at a house in west London as anti terrorist police seized five guns and about 10 tonnes of explosives at another location.
Referring to initial media claims that Mr O'Neill had been killed in a "gun battle", he said: "I think there are various questions that need to be asked, particularly by the media."
Hinting that the British intelligence service, MI5, or the British army's Special Air Services might be involved, he asked: "Do we know that the police were involved? No weapon was found."
The Irish Republican Socialist Party, associated with the Irish National Liberation Army, issued a statement saying it had information that Mr O'Neill was unarmed and that no gun battle had taken place.
Meanwhile, gardai have denied reports that Mr O'Neill, had been recruited into the IRA while on holiday in west Cork.
Supt Bertie Kelleher, of Bandon Garda station, said they would have been aware of any meetings between IRA sympathisers and the Londoner, whose parents moved to a house outside Timoleague village 18 months ago. Gardai knew Mr O'Neill's sympathies and noted his arrivals and departures. "We do not believe he was recruited by the IRA while he was here," he said.
Mr O'Neill's parents, Eoghan and Terry, knew of his republican sympathies especially after he was convicted of stealing £75,000 from the Beggars Bush branch of the Bank of Ireland in London in 1988.