Ritchie firm on UDA arms deadline

Margaret Ritchie will not extend her decommissioning deadline

The deadline for UDA weapons decommissioning will stand, the social development minister has insisted.

In August, Margaret Ritchie gave the loyalist paramilitary group 60 days to being to disarm.

If they fail to do so, she said, she would withdraw £1.2m funding for a project aimed at helping them move away from violence and criminality.

The minister told the UDA they would not get any more time and she would not extend her decommissioning deadline.

Speaking on BBC Radio's Good Morning Ulster, Ms Ritchie said: "The deadline in respect of UPRG and UDA is very clearly in place, 9 October.

"We will be adhering to that deadline. The ball is in the court of the UDA to deliver that peaceful future that the people of Northern Ireland are yearning for.

"The issue is also one where the people of Northern Ireland are saying to me, 'Stand by your position to ensure that we get this peaceful future'."