Sinn Fein set to honour teenage paramilitary who accidentally killed himself while handling landmine - becoming the first southern IRA member to die

Most sources say he was 17 (though an article in the Cork Examiner the day after his death claimed he was 16).

A parade in his honour is set to take place on Friday at 7.30pm.

Organisers told the Parades Commission that up to 300 people would participate.

According to Sinn Fein's Fermanagh branch, it will go from Roslea, in the south-east of the country, to Mullinahinch.

Cork Sinn Fein TD Thomas Gould will speak at a memorial to the dead youth, with Monaghan councillor Pat Treanor chairing proceedings.

Its Facebook page says afterwards there will be a talk in Roslea by Monaghan Sinn Fein TD Matt Carthy and Sean Lynch.

The party branch described Tony Ahern as "a young Irish patriot" who "gave his life for his country".

Meanwhile a different post about Friday's gathering by a Facebook group called Iarchimi Fhear Manach (which means Fermanagh Ex-Servicemen, according to Google Translate) said: "Events in the six counties during the late 1960s and early 1970s made an indelible impression on Tony Ahern.

"Like many other young volunteers in Cork he was determined to play his part in the freedom revolution. He continually pressed the local leadership in Cork to go on active service.

"His request was granted and he went to fight alongside the IRA in Fermanagh... Tony Ahern was the first Volunteer from the 26 counties to be killed on active service in the six counties in this phase of struggle."

Another Cork youth called Dermot Crowley (also in his teens, though his age is uncertain) also blew himself up six weeks later while transporting a bomb near Omagh.

In a piece marking the 30th anniversary of the Ahern fatality, An Phoblacht quoted his brother Maurice as saying: "If they had the same choices to make again, they wouldn't change a thing."

The republican outlet went on report that the both of them were "children of a historical legacy... the products of a nation's dream and destiny as yet unfulfilled; theirs is the story of the cry for freedom".

Roslea's Catholic chapel barred Tony Ahern's coffin from entering until a plaque describing him as a PIRA volunteer was removed, according to An Phoblacht.

The book Lost Lives describes him as having been an apprentice gardener.

It quotes then then-Irish justice minister Patrick Cooney (Fine Gael) as saying at the time of his death: "It is sad to think that in our society there are grown men prepared to suborn children away from the healthy and innocent pastime of normal youth into an unnatural atmosphere of conspiracy and subversion.

"I appeal to parents particularly to keep a close watch on the company that their children are keeping, to avoid tragic events such as happened when this youth was blown to pieces."

More from this reporter:

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• Report into paramilitarism in Northern Ireland declines to mention any paramilitaries

• Elim church remembers 17-year-old Belfast Christian shot dead randomly 30 years ago by socialist republican faction

• ‘IRA offered me revenge upon UVF killer – I turned them down’

• Sean Graham slayings: Murder spree set in motion the deaths of two UDA figures years later