'Extremely significant' bomb discovery believed to have been intended for Northern Ireland attack

LAST UPDATE | 3 mins ago

GARDAÍ ARE INVESTIGATING the discovery of a bomb in car that was travelling towards Northern Ireland earlier this week.

It is believed that the bomb was intended for use in a dissident republican attack in the North.

Garda Commissioner Justin Kelly has described it as an “extremely significant seizure”.

Members of the Special Detective Unit (SDU) requested assistance from the army bomb squad on Wednesday afternoon after they stopped the vehicle on the N2 south of Carrickmacross.

The driver of the vehicle, a woman aged in her 20s, was arrested and detained on Thursday.

A man in his 40s was arrested today. 

They were both arrested and detained under Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act 1939.

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The Garda Commissioner confirmed details of the operation as he spoke to media at a garda graduation event in Co Tipperary on Friday.

“To be clear, what we found was an extremely significant seizure,” he said.

He said that “this was an explosive device” and that “any seizure of this nature is really concerning”.

Dissident activity

Kelly said that “we certainly know that there are a small minority of dissident republicans who did not agree with the Good Friday Agreement, they did not put weapons and explosives (out of use), they didn’t, you know, go through with the proper process in relation to decommissioning”.

“So that is something that we continue to deal with,” he said.

“There’s a small minority of these individuals, I would describe them as radicalised republicans, and this is a threat that we’re going to continue to face for some time in An Garda Síochána.

“We work very closely with our colleagues in PSNI (Police Service of Northern Ireland) and the intelligence services in the UK to deal with this threat.

“But I want to commend the members of An Garda Síochána who are involved in this operation.”

Additional reporting by Niall O’Connor and Press Association