Ahern wants explanation for jailing of IRA bomber

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has demanded an explanation from the British government for its decision to send an IRA bomber released under the Belfast Agreement back to jail.

The decision of Northern Secretary Peter Hain to jail Seán Kelly (33), who killed nine people in a 1993 Shankill Road fish shop bombing, has puzzled some in Government circles in Dublin.

The Taoiseach said he believed Mr Kelly was the first Provisional IRA member to have his Belfast Agreement licence revoked.

"Quite frankly, I don't quite understand it. It is either one of two things. Either it is a mistake, and if it is the authorities will look at it, or there must be substantial evidence that he is not kosher. It must be one or the other.

"Quite frankly I don't know, but I intend finding out. I have been involved in this long enough to know that that decision would not have been made at random.

". . . I do know that Seán Kelly is close to many senior SF people and was considered last year - subject to correction - someone who was very helpful in the [ July] 12th march in Ardoyne. I think that that is correct. I will try and get it as soon as I can. I have already asked officials [ the Anglo-Irish Secretariat in Belfast] to find out what happened.

"They have lifted nobody else. I don't believe that they would have lifted [ him] without something. If there is [ something] it would be better to know. If there isn't a reason it seems very odd that they would pick one person."

Mr Ahern has repeatedly expressed concern recently about the marching season. "I am always about getting through the marching season because it is difficult every year, as long as there is instability in the political process that continues."

Mr Kelly was jailed for bombing the Shankill Road fish shop in 1993 in an attack that began one of the worst periods of violence in the North.