Fighting Returns To Northern Ireland

BELFAST--Irish Republican Army gunmen returned to the attack yesterday, abandoning their 13-day cease-fire.

Gunbattles spread across Belfast and Londonderry and 10 persons died in the fighting.

In the first hours after the IRA provisional wing called off its true Sunday night, six civilians died in Belfast, including a 14-year-old girl and a Roman Catholic priest who was shot as he administered the last rites to another victim. Sixteen soldiers and 10 civilians were wounded.

Earlier Sunday, while the cease-fire was still in effect, police found the bodies of four men who apparently had been executed. The deaths raised the toll for Northern Ireland's three years of bloodshed to 416.

Foreign Secretary William Whitelaw flew from London to Belfast yesterday to confer with security advisers on the crisis, and then flew back to make a statement to Parliament.