The Five Demands

L’Assistant Chief Constable della PSNI informa che gli agenti di polizia si stanno preparando ad un’imminente nuova campagna dissidente

Gli attentati degli ultimi mesi, tra i quali veri e propri attacchi ai danni di ufficiali di polizia, sarebbero il preludio di una nuova campagna dissidente.
Di questo avviso è Drew Harris, Assistant Chief Constable del Police Service of Northern Ireland.
Il timore maggiore è che ore l’attenzione degli attivisti repubblicani possa spostarsi sul territorio britannico.
“Ma al momento ciò di cui siamo davvero preoccupati, sono le minacce contro la gente dell’Irlanda del Nord”, ha affermato Drew Harris.
Nel frattempo Robin Masefield, alla testa di NI Prison Service, ha avvertito agenti di polizia penitenziaria nella regione sono stati costretti a indossare giubbotti antiproiettile a tutela della propria incolumità. Alcuni di loro hanno dovuto dotare di sistemi di sicurezza anche le proprie abitazioni.
Solo lo scorso mese, fonti della PSNI avevano affermato che quella attuale, è la minaccia dissidente più elevata dal 1998, anno della strage di Omagh.

Police warn of new dissident campaign (U TV)
The PSNI Assistant Chief Constable tells UTV that officers are bracing themselves for an intense dissident bombing campaign, after preventing a number of attacks in the run-up to the election.
In an exclusive interview, Drew Harris told UTV the PSNI uncovered plots to kill officers on or off duty and foiled more attacks on police stations.
On results night, counters for the Foyle and East Londonderry constituencies had to be evacuated after a viable device was found outside the Templemore Sports Complex.
Dissident republicans were blamed for planting the bomb in a vehicle outside the count centre.
A taxi driver had a gun put to his head as he was hijacked and told to bring the pipe bomb to the count centre.
A second partial device was later found by police in the ceiling panel of the ground-floor toilet. It was removed by army bomb experts, but police say it could not have exploded.
UTV understands the device did not include a detonator.
“We were relieved up until Election Day there hadn’t been substantive attacks.
“To say we breathed a sigh of relief would be wrong,” said Drew Harris.
“Our guard is still up, we are very conscious of the number of threats there are against our officers and against our community,” he added.
Last month a car bomb was abandoned outside Newtownhamilton police station and a pipe bomb exploded outside the home of an officer’s family in Co Down.
Other bomb attacks occurred outside a courthouse in Newry and at Palace Barracks in Holywood, where the new Northern Ireland M15 headquarters is based.
The car bomb which went off outside MI5 HQ was deliberately timed to coincide with the transfer of policing and justice powers to Stormont.
“They’ve shown their ambition in terms of attacking a courthouse, an attack on palace barracks and a police station and doubtless their ambition then will grow on from that,” Drew Harris told UTV.
Mr Harris warned that dissidents could still take their campaign to Britain.
“Where else would they wish to target?
“It would be foolish of men to discount the threat there may exist to Great Britain.
“But at the moment what we’re really concerned about are the threats against people of Northern Ireland.”
Meanwhile, the head of the Prison Service, Robin Masefield, warned prison officers in the region were forced to wear body armour to protect against the threat.
Some officers even have protection built into their homes.
“We are conscious of an increased threat level, yes, and there was an increased number of warnings, principally but not always exclusively in relation to dissidents,” Mr Masefield told Stormont’s new justice committee.
The warnings came on the day David Ford attended his first meeting of the Policing Board since his appointment as Justice Minister.
The Minister briefed members at Board Headquarters in Belfast on the key priorities for his Department in the coming year, including the current security situation.
Last month, PSNI sources revealed the dissident threat is higher than at any time since the Omagh bombing almost 12 years ago.