Turkish Forum

Tag: Northern Ireland’

  • Real IRA threatens more ‘executions’ of police and disrupt the Queen’s historic visit

    Real IRA threatens more ‘executions’ of police and disrupt the Queen’s historic visit

    By Rob Hastings

    A member of the Real IRA reads a statement during a 1916 Easter Rising memorial at Cregan Cemetery in Londonderry yesterday
    A member of the Real IRA reads a statement during a 1916 Easter Rising memorial at Cregan Cemetery in Londonderry yesterday

     

    The Real IRA warned yesterday that it planned to kill more police in Northern Ireland and disrupt the Queen’s historic visit to Ireland. At a rally in Londonderry to mark the anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising against British rule, a masked member of the dissident republican group told supporters that police would be considered “as liable for execution as anyone, regardless of their religion, cultural background or motivation”. In a statement, the group also branded the Queen a war criminal ahead of her first visit to the Republic from 17 to 20 May.

     

    It called on “any young nationalist who may have been sold the lie” that the Police Service of Northern Ireland had been reformed and was non-political to think again. “Those who think they are serving their community are in fact serving the occupation and will be treated as such,” the statement said.

    The rally, held by the 32 County Sovereignty Movement, came three weeks after PC Ronan Kerr, 25, was killed by a nationalist car bomb in Omagh, Co Tyrone. The masked Real IRA man formed part of a colour party of seven people, all dressed in full paramilitary uniform. Between 200 and 300 people attended the event, which was monitored by a police helicopter.

    The Real IRA statement said the Queen’s visit was an insult that should be resisted by “all self-respecting Irishmen and women”, and was an attempt to “further the selfish interests of a self-serving elite”. “The Irish people will not capitulate,” it added. “The Queen of England is wanted for war crimes in Ireland and not wanted on Irish soil. We will do our best to ensure she and the gombeen [usurer] class that act as her cheerleaders get that message.”

    Mark Durkan, the MP for Foyle and former leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), condemned the speech, saying: “The Real IRA … is morally and politically bankrupt when they are driven to attack and threaten nationalists who want to serve the community and their country.”

    Police aross the province were kept on high alert all weekend. They fear an attack is imminent and have urged the public to remain vigilant. Dissident groups are said to be keen to use the royal visit to Dublin to their advantage, invoking hatred of the monarchy as a way to stir up deep-seated resentment at political division of the island.

    Earlier, three men appeared in court in Newry, Co Down, charged with possessing guns and preparing for terrorism. Brian Sheridan, 34, Brian Cavlan, 35, and Dominic Dines, 39, were held on Friday in South Armagh. In later searches in the same area, police found explosives and bomb-making equipment.

    The İndependent

  • Car bomb explodes outside NI police station

    Car bomb explodes outside NI police station

    A car bomb has exploded outside a police station in Northern Ireland, injuring two people, days after the final formal steps for the peace process in the province were put in place.

    Police northern Ireland

    The device blew up at the Newtownhamilton police station late Thursday night after a warning was telephoned to a Belfast hospital, police said.

    A car bomb was defused at the same spot in the county of Armagh 10 days ago. The Continuity IRA, which opposes the peace process and last year killed a police officer in the bloodiest three days in Northern Ireland for more than a decade, claimed responsibility for that bomb.

    A day earlier another republican group opposed to the peace process, the Real IRA, had detonated a bomb near the Northern Ireland offices of domestic spy agency MI5. The Real IRA shot dead two British soldiers last year, two days before the killing of the police officer.

    The latest attacks were apparently timed to coincide with the transfer of police and justice powers from London and the appointment of Northern Ireland’s first justice minister.

    The moves are the last formal steps under a process, launched by a 1998 peace deal, that has resulted in self-rule for the province by a government representing both Republicans and Unionists.

    Police said they were investigating reports of shots being fired before Thursday’s bombing, which shattered windows and forced homes to be evacuated and residents to be put up in a high school.

    “Those who planted this bomb want to drag Northern Ireland back to the dark days of murder and mayhem, they want to undermine the political process, they want politics to fail,” said David Ford, the newly-appointed justice minister.

    “I am determined that we will all continue to stand together so that they will not succeed,” Ford, the leader of the non-sectarian Alliance Party, said in a statement.

    Northern Ireland’s political leaders, First Minister Peter Robinson and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander, also condemned the attack.

    Analysts have warned that republican dissidents remain active, and police have said the risk of attack, chiefly on security forces, is severe.

    Police said the two wounded people had been taken to hospital but their injuries were not believed to be life-threatening.

    In a separate incident, a pipe bomb exploded outside a house in Coalisland in County Tyrone, shattering windows but injuring no one, police said.

    (Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian in Dublin; editing by Kevin Liffey)

    Reuters