Sir, - Last Week's murder of the former UDA quartermaster and RUC agent William Stobie sheds light on an overlooked area of the peace process, the decommissioning of loyalist paramilitaries.
Surely David Trimble and his fellow unionists cannot now honestly put republican disarmament on top of any agenda, never mind calls for a deadline for decommissioning? The issue of renegade loyalist groups, operating under no political leadership and in no peace process, has to be dealt with at this stage.
This murder, coming at a time when the British Government is under pressure to provide information relating to the 1974 Monaghan and Dublin bombings, further highlights the issue of security force collusion with loyalist groups.
Was William Stobie murdered simply because he was an UDA informer or was he murdered because he was going to provide further damning evidence of security force and loyalist collusion?
But the most disappointing aspect of the incident is Mr Trimble's failure to call for loyalist decommissioning. If this murder had been the work of dissident republicans, I am sure Mr Trimble would have wasted no time in using the event to push for further republican decommissioning and impose deadlines for the full implementation of these measures.
I don't think we will see Mr. Trimble threatening resignation if there are no steps towards loyalist decommissioning. - Yours, etc.,
Cathal Horan, Stillorgan Road, Co Dublin.