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The family of murdered journalist Martin O'Hagan is suing the PSNI and the Ministry of Defence alleging the authorities had information that could have prevented his killing.

The legal proceedings, filed at Belfast High Court, are based on an astonishing claim by a former soldier.

He claims, three days before the murder, he warned Army intelligence Mr O'Hagan was going to be killed.

He claims he was assured the attack would be stopped.

Mr O'Hagan was shot dead by the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) in Lurgan, County Armagh, in 2001.

Police told the O'Hagan family that after accessing the former soldier's Army records, they believed he was lying.

But the O'Hagans said police have provided no explanation as to why they have reached this conclusion and have not interviewed the man about his claims.

The family say they refuse to take the police at their word and have long alleged that the killers have been protected from prosecution.

They have accused the police of not acting on information in the case, in the past.

The former soldier approached Mr O'Hagan's brother Fintan in 2019.

He claimed he had been working undercover for the Army inside loyalist paramilitary organisations, including the LVF.

Speaking to ����ý Northern Ireland's Spotlight programme, the ex-soldier said: "I reported who was going to carry out the hit; I also reported where the weapon was coming from; I also reported where the weapon was being hidden in that week and they assured me that they were going to stop it."

Spotlight asked the former soldier detailed questions over a number of months, and separately investigated his background - establishing that he definitely was in the Army and did have close connections to loyalist paramilitaries.

But Spotlight was unable to conclusively verify his serious allegation.

'What else can they say?'

Fintan O'Hagan said: "It's been a rollercoaster because at the start I 100% believed him.

"But then he would have disappeared and he would have got out of the scene and I was thinking is he telling the truth?"

In response to the police view that he fabricated the story, the former soldier said: "Of course they're gonna say that. What else can they say?

"The Army will never give the police anything about me, so whatever the police think they know, they don't."

He also noted he was willing to talk to the PSNI but when a phone call was arranged between him and detectives, his solicitor stopped the call because the police said they wanted to caution him first.

The O'Hagans' solicitor, Kevin Winters, said he had expected police would try to talk to the former soldier again, either informally or even by arresting him, and he was staggered that two years on, this had not happened.

Spotlight asked the PSNI why it had not sought to interview this man, after an initial contact but it said, because of the ongoing legal proceedings, it would be inappropriate to comment.

The PSNI has insisted it thoroughly investigated the murder in 2001 and 2007.

The former soldier's claims that he had an undercover role and warned Martin O'Hagan was to be murdered were put to the Ministry of Defence.

It also said it could not comment as legal proceedings are ongoing.