The leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, the Rev Ian Paisley, last night gave the names of people he claimed were Provisional IRA members responsible for a massacre in Northern Ireland 23 years ago.
Under the cloak of parliamentary privilege, Dr Paisley read out a list of names which he alleged were included in a police dossier on the Kingsmill massacre, in which 10 Protestants were gunned down by an armed gang.
With the Northern Ireland Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, sitting on the government front bench, he said "wild men" of the republican movement were around today "because of the failure of governments of this United Kingdom to deal with terrorism".
There was something seriously wrong when a government allowed known killers to "walk the streets with impunity", he insisted during an opposition debate demanding an end to prisoner releases while punishment beatings continued in Northern Ireland.
Dr Paisley said that the massacre had sparked "great revulsion", adding: "We were told then that steps would be taken to bring those responsible for that atrocity to the courts and trial. If the government of that day had done its duty, and went after those men ruthlessly and dealt with them, we would not be replaying perhaps even the sad sorrow of Omagh or other atrocities. There are within the republican movement hard men who can fly, at any time they like, flags of convenience."
He said that a police dossier on the massacre had recently come to light and made interesting reading. "It shows that the police did thorough work, had definite evidence and could have, if they had been encouraged, got men into the courts. But no one was brought."
Dr Paisley added: "We are told now by a police officer investigating Omagh that he knows the identity of the Omagh bombers, yet he cannot secure a conviction."