Expert notes central locations in Omagh bomb inquiry

A UK-based data expert has pulled together a presentation showing the links between those suspected of carrying out the Omagh bombing.

Twenty-nine people were killed, including the mother of unborn twins, when the Real IRA detonated a car bomb in Omagh on 15 August 1998.

Mark Safranauskas has worked as an analyst for more than 20 years with Greater Manchester Police.

Among the high profile cases he has worked on was the suicide bombing at Manchester Arena in 2017, which claimed 22 lives and injured hundreds more.

The inquiry has already heard that up to 14 men were potentially involved in planning and carrying out the 1998 Omagh atrocity.

This morning, Mr Safranauskas was taken through a lengthy and detailed video presentation which set out the business, family and social links involving a number of what were called "key individuals".

Paul Greaney KC, counsel to the inquiry, has already said the fact that someone was listed as a key individual does not mean they all "may have been knowingly involved in the bombing".

Mr Safranauskas told the inquiry that the area of Coes Road and the Bay Estate in Dundalk was a central location where there was a lot of contact between those listed.

Some of them lived and worked in that area.

The inquiry team asked him to prepare presentations based on material supplied to him.

He was asked to draw together various strands of evidence and place them into the Inquiry team's "working hypothesis" on the circumstances of the bombing.

The inquiry was told he had had access to a range of material including summaries prepared by the inquiry, diagrams of key individuals and their links, PSNI documents, mobile phone analysis reports.

He also looked at presentations by police, An Garda Síochána and the British Army.

The inquiry said it should be understood that he had not carried out his own investigation but had relied on it to direct him as to what to include in his presentations.

Mr Safranauskas will also present a report on the attribution of mobile telephone numbers to certain individuals.

The inquiry has already named people it says were linked to phones believed to have travelled in the bomb car and the scout car accompanying it, as well as others involved in the conspiracy.