ONH raises stakes for security agenda

Breakaway IRA group Oglaigh na hEireann has claimed that a bomb abandoned in County Fermanagh last weekend was intended to target the hotel hosting British Prime Minister David Cameron and other world leaders attending June’s G8 summit.

The summit is the biggest gathering of world leaders ever to take place in Ireland’s occupied Six Counties.

In a coded statement on Monday afternoon, Oglaigh na hEireann also claimed responsibility for a mortar rocket device aimed at the heavily fortified New Barnsley police barracks in west Belfast two weeks ago.

ONH also provided two photographs of a mortar launching device alongside a printed note stating: “MK1 10KG Mortar, Range 300 Metres.”

The brief statement said:

“Car bomb defused in County Fermanagh on Sat 23rd March. Target was hotel hosting G8 summit in June.

“Photos are of mortar bomb deployed in Belfast on March 15. Target was News Barnsley PSNI station Belfast.

“Oglaigh Na hEireann (ONH) Belfast.”

By specifically referring to the G8 location close to the border, ONH grabbed international headlines and raised security concerns around the summit to fever pitch.

Millions of pounds are to be spent to secure the lakeshore resort for the major international event on 17 June. British police and military have been placed on standby for possible deployment to the North ahead of the event, in addition to the North’s regular PSNI, military intelligence and private security contractors.

The PSNI has also recently acquired a number of spy drones to be flown over the luxury hotel site.

On Saturday morning, the British army defused a 60kg explosive device packed into a beer keg which had been left inside a car abandoned on the Derrylin Road near Enniskillen. It was initially suggested that the target of the device was the nearby Lisnaskea PSNI station, one of the most heavily fortified police bases in Europe.

Another ONH attack this month using a booby trap bomb that was to be triggered by a mobile phone signal was said to have been timed to coincide with a mini Anglo-Irish summit between Cameron and the Irish Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, in Downing Street earlier this month.

A second beer keg with wires attached to it was found abandoned along the Clogh Road in Rosslea in the early hours of Wednesday.

A British Army unit bomb squad officers spent the day examining the suspicious object, close to the border between jurisdictions. The alert continued on Thursday before being declared “an elabourate hoax”.

Urgent Appeal