IRA

Mr Reid's coverage of politics for UTV began in 1994, the year of the IRA and loyalist ceasefires.

Ira Mehlman, spokesperson for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which favors stricter immigration controls, said the council is “ignoring a very clear message from the voters.”

Then in 1981 he was acquitted of drug charges after telling a jury at the Old Bailey he was an MI5 agent spying on IRA drug smugglers and gunrunners.

A disclaimer at the end of each episode acknowledges Adams’ denial that he was ever a member of the IRA or involved in political violence; it’s a claim “Say Nothing” otherwise freely dismisses.

As most of us won’t regard the IRA as an army at war, as it styled itself, but a terrorist organization — as was, certainly, its opposite number, the Ulster Defense Assn. — our hope will be that the sisters survive the IRA as much as their smuggling expeditions, bank robberies and prison terms.