'New IRA' main line of inquiry in car bomb attack
A large number of children at a nearby youth club were minutes away from being caught up in the blast.
Last updated 20th Jan 2019
The dissident republican group the New IRA is suspected of being behind a car bomb attack in Londonderry.
The attack came shortly after 8pm on Saturday when a vehicle exploded on Bishop Street.
Police and army bomb experts remain at the scene.
Police Service of Northern Ireland Assistant Chief Constable Mark Hamilton said the New IRA was their main line of inquiry.
Two men in their 20s were arrested in the city in the early hours of Sunday by detectives investigating the explosion.
"Our main line of inquiry is against the New IRA,'' Mr Hamilton said.
"The New IRA, like most dissident republican groups in Northern Ireland, is small, largely unrepresentative, and determined to drag people back to somewhere they don't want to be.''
Mr Hamilton detailed how a pizza delivery driver was hijacked on Saturday evening, and his car packed with explosives before being left outside the court house on Bishop Street in Derry.
"We believe that some time after 6pm last night (Saturday), in the Quarry Street area of Derry, a pizza delivery driver was hijacked,'' he said.
"He had his Ford Fusion car taken off him by at least two armed men.
"Between then and 7.23pm, a bomb was put in that car, driven at least half a mile to outside the court house on Bishop Street and around three minutes later a phone call went in to the Samaritans in West Midlands in England, which was then passed to West Midlands Police who then contacted us.
"In the intervening minutes we had already found the car and started to evacuate the area. At around 8.09pm, the bomb detonated.
"Fortunately it didn't kill anybody and fortunately it didn't cause widespread damage, but clearly it was a very significant attempt to kill people in the local community.''
He added they got everyone evacuated "just in time''.
"The bomb detonated just as we were leaving the area and it is only by good grace that local people were not killed,'' he said.
Those evacuated from nearby buildings included hundreds of hotel guests, 150 people from the Masonic Hall and a large number of children from a church youth club.
Earlier fears of a secondary device have been ruled out
Democratic Unionist Party leader Arlene Foster said it was a "pointless act of terror'' which "must be condemned in the strongest terms''.
"Only hurts the people of the City. Perpetrated by people with no regard for life,'' she said.
"Grateful to our emergency services for their swift actions which helped ensure there have been no fatalities or injuries.
Derry's SDLP mayor John Boyle challenged those responsible on what the aim was.
He said: "I would actually like to ask the people responsible for this what it actually was that they thought they were going to achieve.
"It achieves nothing, it didn't achieve anything in the past, it didn't achieve anything right now.
"I have a question for them, what was this all about, because quite frankly this is not something that the people of this city wanted to see, it's not something they support, and as Mayor of Derry City and Strabane District Council, I have to say I feel it incumbent upon me to speak out on behalf of the vast, vast majority of people in Derry, Strabane and indeed across this island, this is not what we want.
"This is the past and it has to stay in the past. We don't want to see any more of it.''
Sinn Fein Foyle MP Elisha McCallion has condemned the explosion.
"This incident has shocked the local community,'' she said. In particular, there are many elderly residents who live in the area who have been alarmed.
"Thankfully no-one appears to have been injured.
"Derry is a city moving forward and no-one wants this type of incident. It is not representative of the city.
"I would encourage anyone with information about this incident to bring it to the police.''
The Republic of Ireland's deputy premier Simon Coveney tweeted his disgust at the incident.
"I utterly condemn the car bomb terrorist attack in Derry this evening,'' he said.
"There is no place and no justification possible for such acts of terror, which seek to drag Northern Ireland back to violence and conflict.''
Local SDLP MLA Mark H Durkan tweeted: "Whoever is responsible for this explosion outside Bishop Street Courthouse in Derry clearly hasn't got the message that the people of Derry DO NOT want this on our streets.
"We are trying to move Derry forward and will not let anyone drag us back to the dark days of the past.''
Local Democratic Unionist MLA Gary Middleton condemned the incident as a "disgraceful act of terrorism''.
"PSNI have confirmed there were no injuries in the serious incident at Bishops Street,'' he said.
"Vehicle hijacked with explosion outside courthouse. Disgraceful act of terrorism.''
Alliance Party leader Naomi Long has also voiced her concern about the incident on Twitter, describing it as "very disturbing news''.
The incident happened just a few miles from the Irish border as the Republic of Ireland prepares to mark the 100th anniversary of its war of independence.
The first shots of the war, which saw the southern 26 counties of Ireland become independent of the United Kingdom in 1921 before going on to become the Republic of Ireland, were fired at Soloheadbeg, Co Tipperary on January 21 1919.
Violent dissident republican groups have been responsible for a number of murders over the last 10 years.
They include the killing of Sappers Mark Quincey and Patrick Azimkar outside Massereene Barracks in Co Antrim in 2009 and PSNI Constable Stephen Carroll in Craigavon, Co Armagh in the same year as well as Constable Ronan Kerr in Omagh in 2011.
Dissidents were also responsible for the murders of prison officers David Black in 2012 and Adrian Ismay in 2016.
There have also been a number of narrow misses, including the maiming of Constable Peadar Heffron in 2010, when an undercar booby trap bomb left him seriously injured.