MICHAEL MCHUGH, – UPDATED 04 MAY 2014 11:08 AM
Northern Ireland's First Minister Peter Robinson has accused Sinn Fein of attempting to blackmail the police over the arrest of Gerry Adams.
The party president is undergoing a fourth day of questioning by detectives over the 1972 murder of Belfast mother-of-10 Jean McConville. Extra time granted to police to question him will expire later today.
Amid a growing row over the arrest, Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness has warned his republican party will review their support for policing if Mr Adams is charged.
Martin McGuinness blamed an "embittered rump" left over from before the reform of policing whom he claimed wanted to destroy the peace process.
Mr Robinson said: "The publicly conveyed threat to the PSNI (Police Service of Northern Ireland) delivered by the highest levels of Sinn Fein that they will reassess their attitude to policing if Gerry Adams is charged is a despicable, thuggish attempt to blackmail the PSNI.
"The threat now means that ordinary decent citizens will conclude that the PSNI and the PPS (Public Prosecution Service) have succumbed to a crude and overt political threat if Adams is not charged."
On Friday a judge allowed the PSNI a further 48 hours to hold Mr Adams at Antrim police station. The republican party has warned it will review its support for the force if the veteran leader is charged.
The 65-year-old detainee vehemently denies allegations levelled by former republican colleagues that he ordered Mrs McConville's murder and secret burial more than 40 years ago after she was wrongly accused of passing information to the security forces.
Sinn Fein's decision to sign up to support the police in 2007 was viewed as a major milestone in the peace process and prompted the return to devolved rule at Stormont, with the republican party and the Democratic Unionists entering government together.
Democratic Unionist leader Mr Robinson said: "The PSNI must not be the subject of republican bullyboy tactics. They must be completely free to follow any and all evidence regardless of where it takes them and to decide free of political considerations whether suspects will be charged or not.
"The hive of activity to pressurise the police from charging Adams is obscene politicising of the policing process.
"I warn Sinn Fein that they have crossed the line and should immediately cease this destructive behaviour."
He claimed the republican movement had shown a lack of leadership.
"Their actions allow only one conclusion to be reached - republicans believe they are not subject to the rule of law in the same way as they demand others to be made amenable to the rule of law."
