On the night before his death former senior IRA figure Martin Meehan (62) was searching for dissident republican bombs outside his home, Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams disclosed at his funeral yesterday.
Mr Adams, in his funeral oration at Milltown Cemetery, extended his sympathy to Meehan's wife Briege. He did not suggest that bomb threats contributed to the heart attack that killed Meehan on Saturday but said they allegedly were made by dissident republicans.
"In the week before he died Martin was told of threats from those purporting to be republicans. On the night before his death he was outside his home looking for bombs after a number of bomb threats," said Mr Adams.
"I certainly don't want to raise the temperature on this issue but I think it's a disgrace that this family should be victimised by those who have no popular support whatsoever and not even the pretence of Martin and Briege's record of activism," he said.
More than a thousand people attended Mr Meehan's funeral Mass in north Belfast yesterday morning with several hundred travelling to Milltown Cemetery in west Belfast for his interment.
The Tricolour-draped coffin was flanked by a colour party of men wearing white shirts, black berets and black ties. A black beret and black leather gloves were placed on top of the coffin, which was led along the Falls Road by a single piper.
Among those who shouldered the coffin were Mr Adams and the Shankill bomber Seán Kelly. A large group of senior Sinn Féin members attended the funeral, including Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, junior Minister Gerry Kelly, Tom Hartley and Richard McAuley.
Among senior republicans also present were Brighton bomber Patrick Magee, Bobby Storey, Eddie Copeland, Seán Murray and Danny Morrison.
North Belfast SDLP Assembly member Alban Maginness attended the funeral Mass as did senior Government officials Gary Ansbro and Shane O'Neill.
Mr Adams said Meehan, who was a senior IRA commander in north Belfast, was a sincere republican who was "deeply convinced about the righteousness of the republican cause".
"When it was a time to wage war Martin waged war. When it was time to build peace Martin built the peace," he added.
Meehan, who joined the IRA in 1966 and aligned with the Provisional IRA in the split in 1969, was a "constant in the republican struggle the last 40 years or so".
Mr Adams recalled how Meehan was interned and jailed several times, adding that he received so many police beatings that he received the last rites on four occasions, the last time when he was in his fifties.
"Imagine what he was like in his 20s. Then he was an IRA volunteer. If he could speak now he would tell us he is still an IRA volunteer," said Mr Adams.
The Sinn Féin president said Meehan was in the party's unionist outreach group. "He was eager to persuade them that their best interests are better served in a united Ireland. If you want one sentence to describe Martin's politics, he was about a united Ireland. He was about a republic. He was about the unity of Catholic, Protestant and dissenter."
