A SECOND army mole who infiltrated the upper echelons of the IRA was named by a former British soldier last night.

It is claimed that the informant is Sean Maguire, a Belfast journalist. He has been identified by Kevin Fulton, who is involved in a bitter legal dispute with the Ministry of Defence.

The allegations about Maguire, a convicted terrorist, follow the unmasking earlier this year of Freddie Scappaticci, a Belfast builder, as Stakeknife, the army’s most senior mole in the IRA. Scappaticci, however, has denied this claim.

At one time, Maguire worked alongside Stakeknife/Scappaticci in the IRA’s internal security department. The unit, nicknamed “the Nutting Squad”, was responsible for identifying and interrogating suspected informers.

Maguire and Scappaticci appear in court papers relating to Fulton’s case against the Ministry of Defence.

Maguire’s name was posted on the American website Cryptome last night. The entry reads: “The agent Kevin Fulton has named another agent to solicitors in his fight with the Ministry of Defence. The agent is Sean Maguire from north Belfast. He is also the editor of the North Belfast News, a local newspaper. Fulton intends to call him as a witness in his legal action.”

Fulton is a former soldier who was asked to leave the army and return home to work undercover in the republican heartland of south Armagh.

He came to prominence when he claimed he had warned his police handlers about a planned Real IRA attack just weeks before the dissident republican organisation bombed Omagh in August 1998, killing 29 people.

His claims were dismissed by the police but were upheld in an investigation by Nuala O’Loan, the Northern Ireland police ombudsman. She condemned detectives for failing to act on Fulton’s information.

Fulton believes his cover was blown because of incompetence by his army handlers and is now fighting to be given a pension and a new identity in England.

The naming of Maguire, who is married and aged about 45, has surprised his former IRA colleagues. One said last night: “I would be amazed and disappointed if this is true,” adding that Maguire was “no lightweight, quite an operator”.

In 1976 Maguire received a 16-year sentence for trying to kill two policemen. After receiving 50% remission, which was standard for terrorist offenders in Northern Ireland, he was released in 1984.

More recently, Maguire was involved with Scappaticci in the abduction in 1990 of Sandy Lynch, a police agent. Police and troops swooped on the house where Lynch was being held, arresting those who were holding him. Both Maguire and Scappaticci had left before Lynch’s rescuers arrived.

Neither Maguire nor Scappaticci was aware that the other was being run as an informer by the army’s secretive Force Research Unit.

Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan police commissioner, plans to question Scappaticci about the deaths of several alleged informers killed by the IRA after being interrogated by the “Nutting Squad”. Scappaticci, who was allegedly second-in-command of the squad, is on holiday in Naples. He is due back this week but there are fears he might remain abroad.

Maguire could not be reached last night. Mairtin O’Muilleoir, chief executive of Maguire’s paper, declined to comment.

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