The IRA is issuing anti-social behaviour orders (Asbos) in parts of its republican heartland, the Northern Ireland Assembly heard tonight.
Command structures for the disbanded Provisional movement are still in place and so-called punishment beatings are being covered up, the SDLP's Dominic Bradley claimed.
The IRA has disbanded and decommissioned weapons but the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) has warned current and former members of the IRA may have been involved in the murder of Paul Quinn (23), of south Armagh last October.
Mr Bradley, who represents the border area, said: "In my own consituency, local Provisionals are taking it upon themselves to police our young people, issuing bans of various kinds and their own version of Asbos.
"It doesn't usually require violence. When you have a reputation for violence you don't actually need to hit people all the time."
Sinn Féin is sharing power with the Democratic Unionist Party and has stressed its opposition to violence.
However, last autumn's beating to death of Mr Quinn, of Cullyhanna at a farm in Co Monaghan was linked by the IMC to a gang of former IRA members.
Police and gardaí said people in the area have cooperated with them in their inquiries.
The Assembly was debating an Ulster Unionist motion calling for an end to all private armies.
Mr Bradley added: "The time for transition has long since passed, we can no longer give private armies, no matter what flag they hide behind, the freedom to control our communities. Peace must not just be an absence of organised largescale violence.
"With peace must come freedom, freedom from violence, freedom from the fear of violence and freedom from both overt and covert intimidation."
PA