Ulster ceasefire: Boys are told `to leave or be shot'

FIVE TEENAGE boys have been ordered to leave Northern Ireland by the IRA, which threatened to shoot them, a human rights activist said last night.

Vincent McKenna, of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Bureau, said the warning was issued by the IRA through a Roman Catholic priest in Dungannon, Co Tyrone. At least two have heeded the threat and left the town while waiting to move to England.

Mr McKenna blamed the situation on Mo Mowlam, who on Thursday announced the IRA ceasefire was holding. "The responsibility for this latest outrage is firmly at the door of the Secretary of State. She must resign," he said.

According to Mr McKenna, the IRA men who spoke to the priest were all armed. One of the boys preparing to leave said: "They told the priest the community was sick of us and we'd have to get out, otherwise we'd be shot."

t The remains of an IRA man, Tom Williams, executed 57 years ago in Belfast, have been unearthed from a prison for reburial, the Northern Ireland Prison Service has confirmed.