Car bomb explodes at Newry courthouse

[Jock2413]

Police say it is a "miracle" no-one was killed or injured in a car bomb explosion at Newry courthouse.

Officers were evacuating the area when the bomb went off at about 2200 GMT on Monday. The explosion damaged the gates of the courthouse.
Dissident republicans opposed to the peace process are being blamed for the attack.

There is severe traffic disruption in Newry as the area remains cordoned off and a security operation continues.
Police Chief Inspector Sam Cordnor said: "It is only by sheer miracle that nobody was killed or injured."

The attack comes days after a mortar bomb was abandoned near a police station in the village of Keady, about 20 miles away.


The bomb attack is thought to be the first time a large car bomb has exploded in Northern Ireland since the Real IRA bombing of Omagh in 1998.
In the last few years a number of large car bombs been have planted but have either failed to detonate or only partially detonated.

There have also been several attacks with smaller under-car bombs such as the one which almost killed a police officer in County Antrim in January.

BBC NI Home Affairs correspondent Vincent Kearney said police had been bracing themselves for some kind of response to the Hillsborough Agreement, signed just over two weeks ago.
"The fact that it has taken them so long to respond tells us something about their capabilities," he said.

Northern Ireland Secretary Shaun Woodward said: "This is an appalling attack by a very small group of people who refuse to accept that peace is working in Northern Ireland."
Sinn Fein MP for Newry and Armagh Conor Murphy said: "The fact that we're in the process of devolving policing and justice powers and there's an attack on a courthouse will not be lost on people.

NI Secretary Shaun Woodward: "This is an appalling attack"
"These people are trying to drag us backwards and ensure we have the British army back on the streets."

DUP MLA William Irwin said the bomb was "a cowardly action by those who want to drag Northern Ireland back to the past".
SDLP MLA Dominic Bradley said: "People are saying that they got enough of this sort of thing during the Provo campaign, it was wrong and senseless then and it is wrong now."
Ulster Unionist assembly member Danny Kennedy said the bomb was "proof of a deteriorating security situation in Northern Ireland".

"It represents a clear attack on security services and government institutions. It shows a very worrying level of capability that these dissidents now have."

And last night a body was discovered in Londonderry. The man had been stripped, his hands tied behind his back, and shot twice in the head. Even an SDLP councillor commented on the Stephen Nolan show this morning that it was obvious that this had all the halmarks of previous IRA assassinations. A local (female) Sinn Fein councillor (while portraying herself and her party colleagues as now established angels), had the affront to say that both she and her colleagues condemned this murder and would "stand toe-to-toe" with those responsible. She may not know the people who did this personally, but you can be sure that they are IRA men ... even though there are those who actually believe that they no longer exist and that all their weapons have been handed in and destroyed !!!! I think this incident in itself proves that isn't the case ... strangely enough she excused herself from the programme and took herself off so as not to answer any questions from the listeners, the first of whom was the father of a 15 year-old boy who was murdered in the same barbaric manner by the IRA some years ago and who wanted to know if Sinn Fein would condemn that murder in the same way as she did this one ... but she disappeared and coudn't answer the question. In short, the IRA have not changed ... they've just changed their tactics

both she and her colleagues condemned this murder and would "stand toe-to-toe" with those responsible.I think she meant" arm in arm with those responsible". Your right in saying they have just changed their tactics, and just as deadly. I will never understand why anyone would think they, the IRA, would disarm or disbandon.

[Jock2413]

I saw this on ceefax during the early hours of the morning. It didn't mention if the body had been hooded or bore signs of torture which would confirm it as an IRA execution of someone who had been helping the security forces. It also coincides with the recent warning given to the local shopkeepers about not serving members of the SF. A definite case of "pour encourager les autres"