Loyalist terrorists last night said they would murder a senior Northern Ireland prison governor by the weekend.
The threat from Ulster Volunteer Force inmates in the Maze came after overnight arson attacks on the homes of two prison officers.
The warning came as a farewell message from two boys to the ''greatest Dad in the world'' summed up the horror of the IRA's murder of two policemen in Northern Ireland this week.
With their grief-stricken mother they led hundreds of mourners to the funeral of Constable David Johnston in his home town of Lisburn, Antrim.
The funeral came just two days after he and colleague John Graham were gunned down in Lurgan.
The shootings have led to President Clinton arranging a meeting with Prime Minister Tony Blair before the G7 conference opens in Denver today to discuss the Northern Ireland situation which has now worsened with the threat to the prison governors.
The UVF told staff in the Maze that the attacks on the officers' homes in east Belfast proved they could do what they threatened.
Prison Service sources in Northern Ireland said governors and officers have been warned to look to their security outside the prison.
The attacks are being linked to the refusal of UVF men in two of the H Blocks at the top security prison to co-operate with daily cell searches and head-counts recently introduced after a review of security
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after the discovery of an IRA escape tunnel.
One of the prison officers, whose wife and children were forced to flee their home after petrol was poured through the letter box and set on fire, challenged those responsible to come after him if they wanted, but to leave his family alone.
He said: ''If my children hadn't got out of the skylight on to the roof they would be dead now, the smoke would have got them.''
He said: ''They know who I am, if they want me - come and get me, not my children, not my wife.''
The same gang is thought responsible for a similar attack close by a few minutes later on another prison officer's home.
Finlay Spratt, chairman of the Prison Officers' Association in Ulster, condemned theattacks.
''How can anybody contemplate going along and attempting to burn women and children in their homes - because that is what they were attempting to do.'' Mr Spratt called on the Government to provide better protection for his members. The attacks and threats came after the cancellation of visits to UVF men on Tuesday because of their non-co-operation with the tougher rules introduced after a report into the IRA escape bid branded the regime too lax.
The Prison Service said the visits and movement within the jail would remain suspended until the inmates returned to ''agreed arrangements''.
At the funeral service in Lisburn, seven-year-old Louie and Joshua, just three, who was clutching his drinks beaker, clung to their mother Angie's hands as she wept and reached out to touch her husband's coffin.
Louie penned a card from him and his brother to their father which was attached to a floral tribute of blue and white flowers spelling out Dad.
Ther child wrote: ''I wish this had never happened to you. I wish it could be someone else. I am sorry that had happened to you. Greatest Dad in the World. We love you.''
Twenty miles away at Tandragee, Co Armagh, three little girls, Rebecca, 10, Abigail, seven, and Katie, two, were grieving at the loss of their father Constable John Graham.
Pastor Edward Betts told hundreds of mourners there he wished he could drag the IRA killers to see their victim's devastated family.
At the funeral of Constable Johnston, the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland said the murders of the two policemen had been a ''watershed'' and questioned the Government's policy of trying to involve extremists in shaping the political future of Northern Ireland.
Dr Sam Hutchinson told the hundreds of mourners who packed the church and filled the streets outside: ''With these murders Northern Ireland has passed a watershed, one of those critical points after which things can never be the same again. These killings were a slap in the face for so many people of goodwill who were trying to promote understanding and take risks for peace.''
In a message to the Government he said: ''The time has now come to face reality.
''What further proof is needed now? You have spent time and effort trying to bring extremists in from the cold, and some had hopes and dreams of what might be.
''In the cold light of this sad morning those dreams lie shattered.''
Irish Prime Minister-elect Bertie Ahern last night looked set to abandon plans to meet Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams before assuming control of the Dublin government next week.
Ray Burke, a senior Fianna Fail party colleague of the prospective premier, said talks with Mr Adams were ''highly unlikely'' in the light of the murders.
Meanwhile, Republican sources revealed that John Kennedy Jr was at the funeral last week of a former IRA prisoner. Mr Kennedy joined mourners at the burial of cancer victim Patrick Kelly in Co Laois on Friday.
Mr Kelly, 49, died after being transferred from jail in Britain - where he was serving a 25 year sentence, imposed in 1993 for attempted murder and conspiracy to bomb.
Senior Sinn Fein strategist Martin McGuinness was also at the funeral in the village of Kilinarden.
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