Hardliners 'still fighting terror campaign'
Hardline republican terror groups opposed to the peace process are still trying to mount a more effective terror campaign, the British and Irish governments were warned today.
Ministers were told in the latest report by the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) that the Continuity IRA had reorganised its leadership structure and was training new members in the use of rifles and explosives.
The commissioners also said the Real IRA (RIRA), which was responsible for the 1998 Omagh bomb, was still recruiting and training new members in how to use weapons.
The Real IRA had also targeted police officers.
The IMC said the Continuity IRA (CIRA) was sporadically active in paramilitarism and other crime, threatening members of local policing committees and forcing a taxi in January to carry a bomb to a Belfast police station.
“It has monitored the security force reaction to hoax bombs to help it make future attacks,” the report noted.
“It has undertaken both assaults and shootings ... CIRA has undertaken some reorganisation, particularly in the command structure.
“We believe this may indicate an intention to increase its level of activity.
“It is taking on new members, has continued to train, including in the use of rifles and explosives, and it makes efforts to improve its engineering capacity (particularly in relation to explosives) and its access to weapons.
“It has produced homemade explosives and has moved munitions. As before, we believe it is a dangerous organisation capable of serious, if sporadic, attacks.
“It has no interest in ceasefire and we believe that it plans to continue to engage in terrorism and other crimes, possibly more than in the recent past.”
The commission said the Real IRA contained two factions which were still involved in terrorism and organised crime.
The organisation remained the most active dissident republican group and was behind a number of brutal attacks and robberies, sending postal bombs to members of District Policing Partnerships last September, and in January and February.
The Real IRA mounted gun attacks on police stations in September, October and December, carried out assaults, exiled a person it had previously shot and in the run-up to Christmas was behind a campaign of hoax and genuine firebombs at commercial premises in different parts of Northern Ireland.
In January, the organisation carried out an arson attack on a store in Strabane and in February petrol-bombed a person’s home.
“It has continued efforts to improve its capacity in the use of explosives,” the IMC said.
“We believe this is the work of an organisation which is ruthless and committed to terrorism.
“There have been some arrests of RIRA members in Northern Ireland and the South and three people are currently awaiting trial in the Special Criminal Court in Dublin. The organisation remains a threat.”
The report said the Irish National Liberation Army was still a significant terrorist group involved in violence and organised crime such as the drugs trade.
Although it had not shot or assaulted people as it had in previous six-month periods, the IMC said members of the organisation remained very actively involved in crime.
“The threat of the organisation’s more active re-engagement remains,” the report said.
