BELFAST: Northern Ireland’s deputy prime minister — a former commander in the rebel Irish Republican Army — said yesterday he was under a death threat from militant nationalists after he condemned a mortar bomb plot.
Martin McGuinness said a senior police officer had visited him on Wednesday night and warned him dissidents had made a “real and active” threat against his life.
McGuinness fought a three-decade war against British rule in the province, but joined a power-sharing government with pro-British unionist rivals after the signing of a 1998 peace deal.
That decision made him a hate figure for groups of dissident Republicans, small groups of fighters who continue to fight British rule with sporadic attacks on security officials.
The threat from such groups has intensified as frustration with the power-sharing government has grown in the nationalist community.
REUTERS
