Taoiseach Enda Kenny has rebuked Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams for the failure of the Republican movement to disclose information about the IRA’s 1983 murder of prison officer Brian Stack.

Mr Adams has said the killing was not authorised by the IRA and a senior republican figure was “disciplined” by the group, while its leadership had apologised to the Stack family.

“Kangaroo courts are no substitute for the courts of the land. Gerry Adams seems to have known about this for a very long time. This is another case of the full truth not being known,” said Mr Kenny on the second day of his visit to California.

“The laws of the land are that justice should apply to everybody and somebody who has murdered a man in cold blood should be brought before the courts to be punished by the courts and dealt with by the laws of the land.”

The Taoiseach said he was prepared to meet the murdered officer’s son, Austin Stack.

“This is a cold-blooded murder. The person or persons who carried that out were not brought before the courts, were not punished by the courts and they are after all the only courts we have in our country. Kangaroo courts need not apply here.”