North Louth residents have expressed anger that a disco was held in the foot-and-mouth exclusion zone at the weekend while 500 extra soldiers were joining gardai at checkpoints in an attempt to prevent the disease crossing the Border.
The NV Niteclub is popular with young people on both sides of the Border and gardai confirmed that it had attracted a large crowd on Saturday night. The club is at Carrickarnon, half a mile from the Border on the main Dundalk-Belfast road.
A woman from south Armagh said that the disco had also been held on Friday night just hours after the slaughter of pigs and burning of carcasses at the farm in Meigh where foot-and-mouth disease was confirmed. "I can see the flames from my window and people are crossing the Border to go to discos", she said.
A number of social and cultural events have been cancelled in the north Louth area as it is within five miles of the Meigh outbreak.
Commenting on the holding of discos in the area, the Minister for Defence, Mr Smith, who was in Dundalk on Saturday, said: "For these few days, and maybe weeks, I don't think it is asking too much for people, where it is possible and in the national interest, to cancel the movement of people and to rule out any unnecessary visits."
Mr Smith was speaking in Aiken Barracks, Dundalk, as he prepared to visit a number of checkpoints in the north Louth exclusion zone. He was accompanied by the Army Chief-of-Staff, Lt-Gen Colm Mangan.
The Minister said that enforcement of regulations in the Republic has been more rigorous than in either Northern Ireland or the rest of the UK. Pointing out that the disease did not respect borders, he said that he would exhort everyone to make a 100 per cent effort on every part of the island of Ireland to help block the spread of foot-and-mouth.
"Some reports about the RUC presence seem to indicate that it can be strengthened. This is bigger than all of us and more important than a northern dimension or a southern dimension", Mr Smith said.