JURYS Hotel Group and the British based Stakis Group will shortly announce they are to build hotels in Northern Ireland, The Irish Times has learned.

The Stakis Group will invest Pounds 18 million sterling in a hotel between Belfast city centre and Aldergrove Airport.tourism sources in the North.

Jurys' first hotel in the North will be built in Belfast, the sources say. Negotiations on grant support from the Northern Ireland Tourist Board have been completed. Jurys' managing director, Mr Peter Malone, was not available to comment yesterday, but earlier this month he said Northern Ireland was a possibility for a new inn "but only if it works well. We are in it for profits, not prestige".

Holiday Inn, already building a hotel in Belfast, is to build a second hotel in Derry, the sources say.

Great Southern Hotels was the first hotel group in the Republic to invest in the North. It built the Russell Court Hotel in Belfast in the early 1970s. After trading for a number of weeks, it was closed by a bomb which partially destroyed it.

The Fitzpatrick Hotel Group expressed an interest in managing a half completed hotel in Warrenpoint, Co Down. The Northern Ireland Tourist Board was keen to have a well regarded hotel operator from the Republic move into the northern market and offered generous incentives. However, Fitzpatrick's decided not to