The Irish president has hit out at dissident republicans
during a PSNI graduation parade in Belfast.
President Mary McAleese made the comments in a keynote
speech at the ceremony for new police officers today.
She told the officers they were still vulnerable to the
"tiny minority of wreckers who set their faces against the
humanly decent dynamic of peace."
She said they would be enthusiastically welcomed by the
majority of NI people.
She warned, however, that they were still "vulnerable" to
attack.
Mrs McAleese is from Ardoyne in north Belfast, which earlier
this month saw days of rioting after a disputed Orange Order
parade through the area.
She said the 41 Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI)
graduating constables at the police training college had
been given a resounding vote of support by their senior
commanders.
"On this day we think with respect of all those who have
honored that trust, those who have paid with their lives and
their health, and the families that live today with loss and
heartache," she said.
"We think of you, today`s graduates, holders of that trust,
commencing your careers, welcomed enthusiastically by the
vast majority of citizens, still vulnerable to the tiny
minority of wreckers who have set their faces against the
humanly decent dynamic of this peace."
This is Mrs McAleese`s second time at a PSNI graduation
ceremony, the first being in January this year.
She told the new officers that they faced real challenges.
"You face a local context of ongoing sectarianism and
inter-communal strife but against an encouraging backdrop
where so many people at community level are trying hard to
turn the tide of history in favour of this precious peace,"
she said.
"Today you join the journey into peace not as passive
spectators but as active leaders."
The PSNI was established in 2001 following a 1999 report by
a commission led by Lord Chris Patten which overhauled
policing in Northern Ireland.
PSNI constable Stephen Carroll, 48, was killed by the
Continuity IRA last year and others have been injured by
paramilitaries since then.
Mrs McAleese said there was also support for the PSNI in the
Irish Republic with Garda Commissioner Fachtna Murphy
branding an attack on one force an attack on both earlier
this year.