UVF'S GARDA TERROR BOMB PLOT
Loyalists had targeted cops after ceasefire 
VICIOUS: UVF Godfather Mark HaddockUVF chiefs planned a bombing raid on Garda stations three years after they declared their ceasefire. The Sunday World has been given access to sensitive security documents which detail plans by the loyalist terror group to launch a series of bombing raids across the border, with police stations and Sinn Fein offices the main targets.
In 1994, the UVF announced a cessation of all military action, but despite the public pledge to peace, terror chiefs were secretly planning to bring the 'war' across the border. Disaster According to documents, specific targets had been identified and bombing teams were in place - it was only the intervention of senior British security officers that prevented the island being plunged back into disaster.
Sensitive negotiations that led to the signing of the Good Friday Agreement were already underway, but had the UVF executed their plan, it would have scuppered the peace process. Central to the UVF plan was terrorist supertout Mark Haddock. Commander of the organisation's notorious Mount Vernon Unit in north Belfast, Haddock had been a paid agent since 1991.
Security documents seen by the Sunday World reveal how Haddock was allowed to wage a sectarian killing spree while in the employ of the RUC Special Branch. Up to 12 innocent people were murdered by his unit with the full knowledge of his police handlers. Senior police played God as 'state touts' such as Haddock waged bloody murder.
Officers of the law stood back as paid terrorist informers were allowed to murder innocent people. It's a shameful commentary of the British state's involvement in a dirty war. Haddock - codenamed Roxy - had been recruited to save lives, as it was thought his information would haul Ulster back from the precipice.
Ironically, it was his intervention which foiled a potentially devastating bomb attack on Monaghan. Such an attack would have provoked memories of the UVF bomb raids on Dublin and Monaghan in 1974 which left 33 people dead. For the first time, the Sunday World can reveal how loyalist paramilitaries planned a blitz, while their own representatives were helping to negotiate a peace settlement at Stormont.
In February 1997, Haddock contacted his police handlers. He met them in the car park of a leisure centre, a stone's throw from the Mount Vernon estate. We can reveal the terror boss arrived with a holdall which he placed in the back seat of his handler's car. "I've got something for you," he said.
NOTORIOUS: Mark Haddock was commander of the Mount Vernon Unit in Belfast
Reaching inside the bag, Haddock lifted out a transparent container which contained a jelly-like substance. On top of the object was a flashing red light. Haddock had delivered the bomb intended for Sinn Fein's Monaghan offices to his police handler. Before he could be questioned further he jumped out of the car and fled, leaving his handler with what appeared to a primed bomb in his hands. Police sources have told the Sunday World the handler was left stunned.
Terrified the device would detonate, he drove away from the leisure centre before contacting senior officers. It later emerged that Special Branch were already aware of the UVF bomb plot, but had allowed Haddock's meeting with his CID handler to go ahead. There had been growing concern among some officers that UVF terrorists were allowed to commit murder with impunity. Some felt Haddock's CID handler was being set up by Special Branch.
The bomb was taken away and the Powergell explosives replaced by a harmless substance. It was later transported to the intended target, but had been rendered useless.
Sickening
THUG: Darren MooreInsiders have told the Sunday World that they believe countless lives were saved by Haddock's intervention, but questions remain over RUC Special Branch involvement in the episode, which allowed an agent to meet a fellow officer with a primed bomb.
"This was an officer who had expressed concern that Haddock had been allowed to commit crimes, including murder. Special Branch were worried he was going to blow Haddock out of the water," a retired RUC source told us.
We cannot name the Special Branch officers identified in the documents for legal reasons, but they were responsible for recruiting dozens of paramilitary informers. But instead of preventing death, it resulted in a sickening killing spree. At the centre of the State's shame is the UVF's Mount Vernon unit. Run by Haddock, it is thought they carried out 12 murders in a three-year period, all with the knowledge of senior police officers.
Aided by fellow Mount Vernon goons Willie Young, Darren Moore, Will Glendinning, John Bond and Gary Haggarty, he and Special Branch have the blood of innocents on their hands. Recruited in 1991, Haddock became hooked on murder. His intervention in the Monaghan bomb plan was a rare 'success'.
Haddock used his position as an informer to carry out countless sectarian murders, in return for information such as that which prevented a cross border bombing raid. Special Branch, though, just turned a blind eye.
