A police officer, John Caldwell, was seriously injured in a shooting on Wednesday in the Northern Ireland town of Omagh, known for the IRA bombing that killed 29 people in 1998. Police suspect the attack may have been carried out by Republican dissidents, who acted under masks and shot him while he was training a group of young people at a local sports complex.
Caldwell was rushed to a Derry hospital, where he is in stable condition. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak condemned the “regrettable” attack on a former police officer. Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar called what happened “a grotesque act of attempted murder.”
This is the most serious incident in Ulster since the April 2021 riots, with clashes between unionists and republicans after tensions caused by customs controls between Great Britain and Northern Ireland over Brexit.
Police have opened an investigation into the “attempted murder” of the well-known chief inspector of the town of 20,000 people in western Ulster, one of the IRA’s most active hotspots. “Our main focus of attention is the violent groups of republican dissidents, as well as the New IRA,” local commissioner Mark McEwan told BBC radio.
Police arrested three men, ages 38, 45 and 47, within hours for their connection to the shooting of Detective John Caldwell. The suspects are being questioned and remain in custody. It is not known at this time if they have any links to the New IRA or to republican splinter groups active in the Omagh area.
The Omagh shooting occurs in full countdown in the final negotiation of the Irish Protocol between London and Brussels, questioned by unionists who have refused for more than a year to form a unity government with Sinn Féin, winner in a the last elections. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was preparing to seal the announcement this week, also delayed due to resistance from the hard wing of the Conservative Party.
Amid the power vacuum in Northern Ireland, the shooting has also reignited fears of further violence, with a month and a half to go until the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Peace Agreement which falls on April 10.
At least half a dozen dissident groups, led by the so-called New IRA, are still active in Northern Ireland and carry out sporadic actions, such as the one that occurred in November 2022 in the town of Strabane, near the border with the Republic of Ireland, when a police patrol car was attacked with “a viable explosive device” that caused no casualties. The New IRA also claimed the placement of another flammable liquid explosive under a car in Dungiven in April 2021.
Several unionist groups linked to the paramilitary militias announced for their part two years ago their “resignation” from supporting the Peace Agreement and the creation of the so-called “Loyalist Communities Council” (LCC), which includes militias still active such as the Ulster Voluntary Force (UVF), Ulster Defense Association (UDA) or Red Hand Commando (RHC).
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