Well those rules didn't apply to the Loyalists either.

A lot of the killings on both sides were of dyed-in-the-wool activists. A lot were not. There were many points between. A big difficulty I've always had with the conflict is that I wasn't there to see the social tensions, the family feuds, the discrimination, the segregation, the radicalisation, the shitty living conditions, the repressive constant presence of soldiers in your street, the road blocks and the constant atmosphere of fear. Many of the killings had a context that I can't get my head round, which isn't meant to sound like an excuse for them. There will have been many clear cases of executions rather than killings in fighting. I don't understand the prisoner release either. In this case, it was clearly an execution of an unarmed man by several soldiers. He was an activist and he put himself in harm's way, but that in itself doesn't, and shouldn't, get you the death sentence.