Action will be taken against loyalist paramilitaries if it is found they have broken their ceasefire, Northern Ireland Secretary Dr John Reid warned today.
Dr Reid said he would clamp down on any groups supposedly on ceasefire if it was proved they were involved in recent violence.
"I rely on the advice of the chief constable and my security advisers on that and I will not hesitate to act accordingly if they are of a view and can provide new evidence that some of these groups, which are supposedly on ceasefire, are not," he said.
In recent weeks the simmering feud between the Ulster Volunteer Force and the Loyalist Volunteer Force has reignited in Belfast and Portadown, County Armagh.
The most recent attack, in which a man was shot and seriously injured in the Loyalist Ballysillan area of north Belfast, was blamed on the LVF.
Dr Reid said he was "sickened and disgusted" by recent sectarian violence between rival gangs of youths in east Belfast.
He also condemned the weekend attack on three Australian visitors by a nationalist mob from the Short Strand area.
"What sort of message does this send to the outside world?" he said. "Here we are where the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland are working courageously and constructively with each other to build a new Northern Ireland and three visitors are subjected to that sort of treatment."
PA