This article is from the source 'bbc' and was first published or seen on . It will not be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/foyle_and_west/8442683.stm
The article has changed 10 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 2 | Version 3 |
|---|---|
| UDA set to confirm weapons dumped | UDA set to confirm weapons dumped |
| (30 minutes later) | |
| The Ulster Defence Association (UDA) is expected to announce on Wednesday that it has put its weapons beyond use. | The Ulster Defence Association (UDA) is expected to announce on Wednesday that it has put its weapons beyond use. |
| The loyalist paramilitary group has five weeks to meet the government's 9 February deadline to complete the decommissioning of its weapons. | The loyalist paramilitary group has five weeks to meet the government's 9 February deadline to complete the decommissioning of its weapons. |
| Once this amnesty ends, any UDA weapons discovered by police would be forensically tested and evidence could be used in future court cases. | Once this amnesty ends, any UDA weapons discovered by police would be forensically tested and evidence could be used in future court cases. |
| It is understood the UDA leadership put its weapons beyond use in recent weeks. | |
| Witnessed | |
| Details of the process are expected to be announced at a news conference on Wednesday morning and confirmed in a statement from General John de Chastelain, the head of the international decommissioning body which witnessed the act. | Details of the process are expected to be announced at a news conference on Wednesday morning and confirmed in a statement from General John de Chastelain, the head of the international decommissioning body which witnessed the act. |
| General John de Chastelain is expected to confirm the move | |
| The move comes more than 15 years after the UDA announced its ceasefire and 12 years after the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning was set up. | |
| A breakaway UDA faction in south east Antrim decommissioned a small quantity of weapons last summer and told General De Chastelain it would also complete the process before the February deadline. | |
| The body which monitors paramilitary activity in Northern Ireland said in its last report that the UDA remained effectively split into two distinct groups - the mainstream UDA and the south east Antrim group. | |
| The Independent Monitoring Commission said in November that members of both factions remained involved in a range of criminal activity. | |
| It is thought that the UDA and the UFF, a cover name it used for its paramilitary activities, were behind 259 murders between 1969 and 2001. | |
| The Ulster Volunteer Force completed decommissioning in June last year. |