Editorial: 'Kevin Lunney and the rule of law'

"We get all sorts of attention for a period of days and all of a sudden we are on our own again," he says. Mr McCaffrey and Mr Lunney, and his family, and all of their colleagues and their families at Quinn Industrial Holdings should know that they are not on their own, nor will they ever be alone again.

The people of Ireland stand with them at this moment, and will into the future, until the perpetrators of the brutal attack on Mr Lunney are brought to justice and an end is brought to the campaign of intimidation and terror which has assailed that part of the island - described as "Quinn country" - which is, in fact, not a territory owned by any one individual or family but are the counties of Cavan and Fermanagh in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, part of our shared democracies and subject to the rule of law.

The authorities, both political and policing, should know that too. The public will not stand for this. For too long, if not a blind eye, then certainly insufficient effort has gone into the investigation and stamping out of that campaign of intimidation and terror and to the application of justice to those responsible.

It is authoritatively reported that there have been 70 such incidents, to varying degrees of threat, in the last eight years or so, from common assaults, to the burning of cars, verbal intimidation and, preposterously, the leaving of a pig's head at the door of a family home.

There was also an anonymous letter, posted in May, to the headquarters of Quinn Industrial Holdings, which identified the five directors at the company, one of them Mr Lunney, and threatened a "permanent solution". The time has come to put the people responsible for these events out of business and behind bars where they belong, and the authorities should spare no effort in this regard until that outcome has been achieved.

Furthermore, it can be asked, is there anything more that Sean Quinn, the former businessman - once Ireland's richest man - can do? He once owned the companies in Quinn Industrial Holdings. He has said that he fears he will be blamed for the attack on Mr Lunney.

In any democracy, which upholds the rule of law and in the absence of evidence to the contrary, nobody can be blamed in the wrong. His reaction to the attack of Mr Lunney, he says, is the same as anybody else, a "sense of outrage".

That is the proper reaction insofar as it goes. However, Mr Quinn should consider whether he can go further than the expression of outrage. He could always ask himself whether there is anything, at all, further he can do to help bring about an end to the intimidation and terror perpetrated by persons unknown to him, unbidden but apparently using the Quinn name, although not at his behest or that of his family.

If he finds that the answer to that question is yes, then he should do it. It would be the least Mr Quinn owes Ireland.