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12 arrested inOmagh bombing

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

By Andrew Bushe

DUBLIN — In a closely coordinated intensification of the Garda and the RUC hunt for the Real IRA gang behind the Omagh bombing atrocity last month, 12 people are being questioned on both sides of the border.

Dawn raids on homes in Monaghan and Armagh on Monday led to the arrest of six men in the North and three in the South. Another three men were arrested by Gardai in Monaghan later in the day.

Both police forces have been cooperating closely in the hunt for the Real IRA group whose bomb ripped through the center of the town killing 29 people on Aug. 15.

Special groups of detectives have been set up on both sides of the border to investigate the massacre and senior officers have been pooling information.

They are believed to be using tough new legislation passed by the Dublin and London parliaments in the wake of the explosion.

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The RUC would only confirm that the men arrested in the south Armagh area were being questioned about serious crime. All were flown to Gough military barracks in Armagh for questioning.

Gardai say the suspects detained in the south were being questioned in Monaghan and Carrickmacross, the town from where the Vauxhall car used in the bombing was stolen two days earlier.

Gardai say the men are single and aged between 19 and 30. There was no indication from either force that the men may be charged.

Five men arrested in the North in the immediate aftermath of the bombing were subsequently released without charge.

Since then, at special emergency sittings the Oireachtas passed an amendment to the Offenses Against the State Act and Westminster voted through the Criminal Justice (Terrorism & Conspiracy) Act.

The new legislation allows the courts in both jurisdictions to convict suspects on the opinion of a senior police officer that they are members of a paramilitary organization.

Meanwhile, in Belfast, five members of the IRSP, the political wing of the INLA, have been accused by the RUC of falsely imprisoning and assaulting a self-confessed police informer.

The IRSP says there are serious implications for the INLA cease-fire and Sinn Fein is also concerned, saying the action shows the RUC is still operating to “the old agenda.”

The case concerns Belfast man John Bowen, who appeared at an IRSP press conference last week admitting he’d been informing on the organization for 12 years.

He left the press conference accompanied by a Redemptorist priest who took him to Portglenone, Co. Antrim. He disappeared from there, and is again back in RUC protective custody.

Since then, 10 members of the IRSP have been arrested. Their offices were also raided, with the Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, intervening at one point to protest.

In an affidavit read to the High Court in a habeus corpus case brought by Bowen’s wife, Angela, he says he was assaulted and told what to say at the press conference.

Angela Bowen said she did not believe he was in police custody voluntarily, but the court dismissed her claim and her case was thrown out.

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