Sinn Féin under fire from DUP over NI policing remarks

NI's First Minister Peter Robinson has described Sinn Féin 'threats' to reassess their future involvement in policing as despicable.

Mr Robinson said the PSNI must not be the subject of 'republican bullyboy tactics' and must be 'free of political considerations'.

Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams is undergoing a fourth day of questioning over the murder of Jean McConville.

Mr Adams denies any involvement in the killing.

On Friday, Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness hinted that his party may look again at whether it would continue to support the PSNI.

In a statement on Sunday, Mr Robinson, the Democratic Unionist Party leader said: 'The protest action taken by Sinn Féin is unacceptable in any democratic country operating under the rule of law.'

Mr Robinson described what he called a 'publicly conveyed threat to the PSNI' from Sinn Féin that 'they will reassess their attitude to policing if Gerry Adams is charged' as 'despicable' and 'thuggish'.

'The PSNI must not be the subject of republican bullyboy tactics,' the DUP leader said.

'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.'

Police have until 20:00 BST on Sunday to charge or release Mr Adams. A source told the BBC on Saturday that Mr Adams was being questioned for up to 17 hours a day.

The source said there would need to be a significant development for a charge.

If charged he would appear at a special court sitting on Sunday or Monday.

Mrs McConville, a mother of 10, was murdered in 1972.

On Friday, a judge gave police an extra 48 hours to question Mr Adams.

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness, has said Mr Adams's arrest was part of an effort by some police officers to 'settle old scores, whatever the political cost'.

Speaking at a rally in Belfast on Saturday, he referred to 'an embittered rump of the old RUC (Royal Ulster Constabulary)'.

The RUC was replaced in 2001 by the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI).

Mr McGuinness said: 'Allegations contained in books and newspaper articles which the PSNI are presenting to Gerry as evidence that he was in the IRA in the 1970s have been around for 40 years.

'But they are only now trying to use these. Is this not political policing?

'This is a replay of the failed effort in 1978 to charge Gerry with membership [of the IRA].'

The party has claimed the arrest was deliberately timed ahead of elections in three weeks' time.

Secretly buried

Mrs McConville, a 37-year-old widow, was abducted and shot by the IRA.

Her body was recovered from a beach in County Louth in 2003.

She is one of Northern Ireland's Disappeared, those who were abducted, murdered and buried in secret by republicans during the Troubles.

She was kidnapped in front of her children after being wrongly accused of being an informer to the British Army.

Last month, Ivor Bell, 77, a leader in the Provisional IRA in the 1970s, was charged with aiding and abetting the murder, and there have also been a number of other arrests recently.