Republicans along the Border have said they have no idea as to how the Provisional IRA moved the body of Eamonn Molloy to a graveyard just outside Dundalk, Co Louth. They insisted the body had not been buried in the immediate vicinity and said the Provisionals would have needed help to both dig up and transport it.
Local people reported seeing two British army helicopters in the area on Thursday night and the local radio station carried reports of an alleged incursion yesterday morning. A British army spokeswoman said she had no reports of any military aircraft in the area that night.
Mystery surrounds the discovery of the body in Faughart graveyard early yesterday. Even normally well-informed republican sources had no idea as to whether it had been buried north or south of the Border or how it was transported to the graveyard. "We don't know where Eamonn Molloy had been buried," said one. "There certainly was never any rumour that his grave was in this immediate vicinity." Another republican source said it was unlikely the Provisional IRA would have been able to dig up and move the body without expert help.
"Eamonn Molloy was killed 24 years ago so his body would have badly disintegrated. There is no way anybody could just go into a field, start digging with a spade and find it. Over the years, ground naturally shifts. Specialist equipment would be needed and the IRA doesn't have that sort of stuff. It is also unlikely that a body and a coffin could be moved around an area of such high surveillance without the knowledge of the military."
The Provisional IRA has not released details of where Mr Molloy was buried or how his body was transported to Dundalk. Some republican sources said although most of the disappeared were abducted and killed in Belfast, it helped the Sinn Fein leadership that the first body was recovered in Dundalk, as the area was a dissident stronghold.