"I think it is falling into the trap of republican agendas and I believe they have moved from an armed conflict to an unarmed conflict.

UDA defied the government after ceasefire was declared over

"They are perpetuating conflicts at interfaces to try and make sure the British Government does not welch on agreements within the Belfast Agreement."

The UDA claimed responsibility for the murder of Catholic postman Daniel McColgan in Newtownabbey earlier this month.

The father-of-one was shot dead as he arrived for work at the sorting office on the loyalist Rathcoole estate.

String of murders

Initially, the southeast Antrim UDA brigade used the cover name, the Red Hand Defenders, to admit carrying out the murder. But it then admitted responsibility. The police also said they believed a UDA faction was behind the shooting.

The UDA extended the threat to all Catholic postal workers and school staff and teachers in north Belfast which it had said were "legitimate targets".

However, the threat was apparently lifted when a statement issued in the name of the Red Hand Defenders said it would disband.

The southeast Antrim UDA is suspected of directing a string of recent sectarian murders and attacks in the north Belfast and Antrim areas.

Daniel McColgan: Murdered in Rathcoole by the UDA

The brigade had been responsible for an upsurge in UDA violence long before the whole paramilitary group's ceasefire was declared over by Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid in October 2001.

This followed an increasing UDA rejection, particularly within that brigade, of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which its political allies in the Ulster Democratic Party helped to negotiate during cross-party talks.

The UDA's formal rejection of the Agreement in a statement last summer was followed by the dissolution of the UDP as a political party.