This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The New IRA has claimed responsibility for an attempt to murder a police officer with a car bomb in Northern Ireland last week.

The republican dissident group said in a statement on Thursday night that it planted the device that was discovered under the officer’s car at Shandon Park golf club in Belfast on Saturday. It was defused without causing casualties.

“We were unlucky this time but we only have to be lucky once,” said the statement, which was passed to the Irish News using a codeword.

The statement underlined the New IRA’s determination to continue its terror campaign despite a backlash over the killing of the journalist Lyra McKee in Derry in April.

The device, which police have called sophisticated, was planted under the 55-year-old officer’s car outside his home on Friday night. It was spotted the next day at the golf club.

“We are confident the device would have exploded if it was not for the level terrain it had travelled on,” said the statement, which referred to the group as the “IRA”.

Security forces call it the New IRA to distinguish it from the Sinn-Féin-aligned Provisional IRA, which waged a three-decade campaign during the Troubles before calling a ceasefire in 1994 and backing the 1998 Good Friday agreement.

Two cars linked to the attempted bomb attack were found on fire in the Ardoyne area of north Belfast early on Saturday. One of the cars had Dublin licence plates, prompting a cross-border investigation.

DCI Stuart Griffin, of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, said detectives were aware of the claim of responsibility and that it would form part of the investigation.

The New IRA emerged in 2012 via a merger of several groups opposed to the peace process, including the Real IRA. Police believe it has several hundred active supporters, a mix of former Provisional IRA members and new, young recruits.

Q&A What is the New IRA? Show Hide The New IRA is the biggest of the dissident republican groups operating in Northern Ireland. It has been linked with four murders, including the shooting of journalist Lyra McKee in Derry in April 2019. The group is believed to have formed between 2011 and 2012 after the merger of a number of smaller groups, including the Real IRA, which was behind the 1998 Omagh bombing. Its presence is strongest in Derry, north and west Belfast, Lurgan in County Armagh, and pockets of Tyrone, including Strabane. In January 2019 the group was responsible for a car bomb outside the courthouse in Derry. The explosives-laden car was left on Bishop Street on a Saturday night, and scores of people, including a group of teenagers, had walked past before it detonated. The New IRA also claimed responsibility for a number of package bombs posted to targets in London and Glasgow in March 2019.

One of its members shot McKee, 29, during riots in Derry in April. The group apologised and said he was aiming at police. The murder galvanised a renewed attempt by political parties to restore Northern Ireland’s collapsed power-sharing government. Talks at Stormont continue.

The New IRA also claimed responsibility for a car bomb outside Derry’s courthouse in January and letter bombs sent to Britain in March. Its members murdered two prison guards, David Black in 2012 and Adrian Ismay in 2016.