A loyalist source has contacted me to tell me that the East Belfast UVF have been stood down, effective from midnight tonight.
The statement is believed to have been issued by the UVF Brigade Staff, the group’s central command. It was read out across different areas as members of the paramilitary group met to commemorate Remembrance Sunday. A source said “loud cheers rang out at the news!”
“They’re an embarrassment to loyalism,” the source told me.
A few weeks ago I gave evidence to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee where I said that there were more paramilitaries now than 30 years ago. While I acknowledged that some of these paramilitaries were involved in criminal activity, many were not and it now seems have rallied around the vision for the future as mapped out by the UVF Brigade Staff on the Shankill and across other areas that conflict transformation is the way ahead.
As news filters out about this significant development, it is clear that the UVF central leadership has taken this bold step in response to a whole raft of arrests and drug seizures by the Paramilitary Crime Task Force, a partnership between the PSNI, National Crime Agency and HM Revenue and Customs.
The East Belfast UVF has been considered a rogue element for many years. It has been largely autonomous in terms of its leadership and command structure but ultimately remained tied to the overall paramilitary parent group, directed from the Shankill Road.
This news will be greeted with skepticism in some quarters but it is clear that the UVF has taken a positive step to clean up its image and move towards what many analysts see as the unfinished business of the peace process and, ultimately, group transition.
I will write more about this developing story as I get it.
Appreciate the updates and yes, a lot of us are reading your work.
We are very focused on peace and bringing the best of what’s possible to Northern Ireland first to heal the separation of people.
The second is to reunify. To have a singular Ireland seems to be a dream. We need to bring the dream to humans who’d just appreciate the unity of freedom for the small world of the Irish.
Peace and harmony is all I wish for you and your mission.
Kind regards,
Tom
Remarkable similarities to Billy Wright and mid ulster UVF if people don’t swallow the Shankill road narrative then they are informers and drug dealers they’d go to any lengths to get that 5£million in grant money , you would think the paid informers would be getting enough money