Last Terrorists Leave N. Ireland Prisons
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LISBURN, Northern Ireland — The final convicted terrorists freed as part of Northern Ireland’s compromise for peace strode out the prison gates Friday, some expressing “true remorse” for their victims and others declaring themselves “unbowed and unbroken.”
The 86 inmates released from Maze and two other prisons--among them some of the province’s most notorious bombers and mass murderers--were greeted by their paramilitary comrades with champagne and confetti, cheers and chants, and lots of partisan flag-waving.
Their release brought to 428 the number of prisoners granted early paroles in one of the most bitterly opposed provisions of the province’s 1998 peace accord.
“It is our hope that we will prove to be the last generation forced to war in defense of our community,” the newly freed members of the Ulster Freedom Fighters said in a joint statement read outside the Maze prison near Lisburn, southwest of Belfast.
The statement added that members of the banned pro-British paramilitary group offered their “abject and true remorse to the innocent victims of this conflict.”
Jim McVeigh, the Irish Republican Army’s leader in the Maze, described the 48 IRA inmates released Friday as “unbowed and unbroken.”
Friday’s mass release left just 16 inmates at the Maze.
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