Sinn Féin has demeaned its electorate by using its mandate to deny the IRA carried out the £26.5 million Northern Bank robbery, the SDLP leader Mr Mark Durkan claimed today.
Mr Durkan launched his attack on Sinn Féin at his party's annual conference in Derry, claiming the party only looked after its own interests in negotiations.
The Foyle Assembly member also hit out at Sinn Féin's definition of a crime and its refusal to accept the IRA was responsible for the Northern Bank raid.
"To those who think the IRA don't pull off robberies, they do," the former Stormont Deputy First Minister said.
He accused Mr Gerry Adams of lying over previous robberies. "So Gerry, how can we believe you now?" he asked. "Why would we believe you over the Taoiseach who has done so much for the peace process? Why would he say what he did unless he had the clearest and most convincing Garda intelligence in front of him?
"Now Mitchel (McLaughlin) said it was a crime because the IRA didn't do it. Then he said it wouldn't have been a crime if the IRA had done it, because the IRA don't do crime.
"As for Pat Doherty, he said it was a crime but then asked: what is a crime? Democratic Ireland can tell you what a crime is. Holding families hostage is a crime. Murdering a policeman or a postman is a crime.
"Abducting a mother of ten and disappearing her body for over 30 years is a crime. Denying her the dignity of a Christian burial is as criminal as it is cruel."
Mr Durkan said Sinn Féin appeared to believe the Republican Movement and its members were above the law. But he added the truth was that so much of what they said and did was beneath contempt.
The SDLP leader claimed Sinn Féin negotiators had been incompetent during last year's talks to revive devolution, accusing them of handing sweeping new vetoes over to the Rev Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists. He also said Sinn Féin had not negotiated for nationalist rights or in the Irish national interest. "They had no interest in inclusion," Mr Durkan alleged.
"There's only one thing Sinn Féin are true to: their name. Sinn Féin means ourselves. "That's all they care about. That's who and what they negotiate for - themselves. So much for their Ireland of equals."
Earlier, the party's justice spokesman Mr Alban Maginness said it was time for an all-Ireland bureau to strip crime gangs and terror bosses of the proceeds of crime.
"This could be easily achieved by the fusion of the Assets Recovery Agency in the north and Criminal Assets Bureau in the south," the North Belfast MLA said. "It is time for the authorities, north and south, to create new mechanisms for depriving paramilitary criminals of their spoils.
"Many criminal gangs are in fact using the shelter of the border as a way of evading or avoiding their illicit riches being detected."
His comments as the spotlight continues to fall on the Provisional IRA over the Northern Bank robbery. Assets recovery agencies on both sides of the border have scored a number of successes against loyalist paramilitaries and crime gangs.
In Northern Ireland, the home of murdered Red Hand Commando member Jim Johnston in Crawfordsburn, Co Down was auctioned after £1.5 million of his assets were seized.
SDLP Policing Board member Mr Alex Attwood accused Sinn Féin of lacking the courage to sign up to new policing arrangements because the IRA was prospering from crime. Mr Attwood claimed his rivals had no credible policing agenda.
Sinn Fein will not take their seats on Northern Ireland's Policing Board and local District Policing Partnerships because it says police reforms do not go far enough. The SDLP has challenged this and taken its seats despite threats to, and intimidation of, its Policing Board and DPP members from both hardline and mainstream republican paramilitaries.
PA