A former counter-terror officer has challenged Gerry Adams’ claim that the UK government was the prime reason why "it took so long" for the PIRA to decommission its weapons and accept that a "peaceful way" had been found to pursue its objectives.

Ex-detective inspector William Matchett stressed that it was the PIRA which had been the main "aggressor" in the conflict, not the UK government.

He also said that IRA decommissioning had only come because the group had been "forced towards a political exit – if there hadn't been effective security against them, the IRA would still be killing".

Former Sinn Fein president Mr Adams had made his comments to the Press Association news agency, marking 20 years since the IRA agreed to start decommissioning.

placeholder image — Gerry Adams had said that decommissioning 'took so long because the two governments, particularly the British government, only sought peace on its terms'

“You have to go back to Father Alec Reid, Father Des Wilson, myself, John Hume and the endeavour to put together an alternative to armed struggle," Mr Adams said.

“It took all that time to do that, but that’s what the IRA said in its statement, that they believed there was now a peaceful way to pursue republican and democratic objectives…

"It took decades and one of my regrets is that it took so long. In my humble opinion it took so long because the two governments, particularly the British government, only sought peace on its terms, which meant defeat the IRA, it meant defeat republicanism and that doesn’t work, our people are resolute."

Mr Matchett, a former member of Special Branch who served as a counter-terror officer from 1988 to 2014, said the PIRA had shunned the democratic process from the outset.

When the PIRA had "declared war" in 1969, "they didn't go to the people, they didn't go to democracy", he said.

"It's just like a brazen re-writing of history," he said of Mr Adams' remarks.

"There was only one outfit, only one entity, which waged what it called 'war' – that was the Provisional IRA.

"They were the aggressor. They were the oppressor which actually kept the whole thing going."

He said the IRA itself had adopted what became known as the "long war" strategy in the mid-1970s.

The objective was to build up a political movement but keep violence going as long as possible because it polarised society and was politically advantageous, he believes.

By the 1990s, the success off the police/intelligence work against the IRA meant that the only option left for republicans was to begin to make the final transition from violence to politics.

Had the UK government not been "weak", it could have forced the IRA into "abject surrender".

"The Provisonal IRA had actually dug in to protract this as long as possible," he said.

"What they were looking to create was as much division by this conflict, and then once it's over, exploit the division they've created.”

In addition, Mr Adams had been quoted telling the Irish News that he had come to recognise that the IRA’s “day had come, and it was gracious enough to also accept that and to exit”.

This prompted North Belfast DUP MLA Phillip Brett to say: “The IRA did not graciously step aside, it was forced to abandon its campaign of sectarian terror due to being brought to its knees by the British security services.”

He vowed that his party would resist “Sinn Féin’s ongoing effort to airbrush history and recast the IRA’s actions as some sort of reluctant but dignified struggle”.