The first major acts of loyalist decommissioning have now taken place, the Belfast Telegraph can reveal today.

Speaking to this newspaper, senior loyalists have disclosed details of a secret process, in which arms have been put beyond use in recent days.

It follows a prediction a week ago when an informed source told this newspaper that decommissioning would happen “before the month expires”.

That prediction was made with General John de Chastelain, Tauno Nieminen and Andrew Sens of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning in Belfast.

One source said the General was in Northern Ireland yesterday and was in contact with loyalists, but there is no confirmation of this.

Sources who have spoken to this newspaper suggest the biggest act of decommissioning is by the UVF. It is further claimed that the UDA has made a start to the process — or that that move is imminent.

Last night it was said that other loyalist groups were in an advanced stage of preparation for decommissioning. It is not yet clear how the news will emerge officially.

“I heard it (decommissioning) was done,” one loyalist said.

“I’m absolutely sure,” the source continued.

Another source, who recently predicted an imminent decommissioning move, last night said: “I’m even more sure now” — meaning the process had begun.

Another source declined to |discuss the details of what had happened.

“I wouldn’t like to jeopardise the bigger picture,” he said — adding that he wanted to see this “across the line”.

That suggests there is more work to be done — that whatever has happened it is not yet finished business.

There are still many unanswered questions, about the scale of what has happened, how much detail will be revealed and when.

Secretary of State Shaun Woodward set an August deadline for the loyalists — UVF, UDA and Red Hand Commando — to make significant progress, and threatened to remove the amnesty provisions of the decommissioning legislation if that deadline was not met.

That would mean effectively ending the decommissioning process.

Mr Woodward will make his decision when he reads a report from the IICD, from the three commissioners who have been in Ireland in recent days.

It is not clear if that report will now be made earlier than the planned August date.

There is also the question of when the paramilitary leaderships will tell their members.

“This (the detail of decommissioning) has remained within a small exclusive group,” one loyalist told this newspaper.

The loyalist groups were hiding hundreds of weapons in secret arms dumps scattered across Northern Ireland.

In 2007, the UVF, UDA and Red Hand Commando all issued what were intended as endgame statements, but there was no decommissioning.

Now, according to the senior sources who have spoken to this newspaper, that has changed.

As more detail emerges the Northern Ireland Office is likely to point to the setting of that August deadline, and the fact that it now looks to have worked.