Pipebomb factory: Five with INLA links held
The factory was being run by the INLA from inside an apartment in a modern complex in the Clondalkin area.
Gardaí said pipebombs were in the process of being made. A search recovered components for pipebombs, as well as suspected explosive material.
Five men, aged in their mid-20s, were arrested at the scene. Gardaí suspect the apartment was also a “training school” to show INLA members how to make pipebombs.
Detectives suspect the bombs would have been used by the INLA in both their own feud with a Dublin drug gang and for sale to criminal organisations.
The seizure was hailed by senior officers as a “very significant operation” against a violent terrorist organisation heavily involved in organised crime.
Gardaí suspect that people associated with the head of the Dublin INLA unit, presently in jail, operated the factory.
Yesterday’s operation was conducted by the Special Detective Unit, which targets subversive organisations. It was supported by the heavily armed Emergency Response Unit.
The Garda team entered an apartment at Park West at about 1.30am. Gardaí said that it was a quick operation, completed in a short period of time and without significant resistance.
An army explosive ordinance disposal team was called to the scene and the area was declared safe.
Gardaí said they recovered component parts for “improvised explosive devices”, in this case pipebombs. Sources said the bombs were “in the process of being constructed” and were not far off being completed. Detectives said the assembly system was “quite sophisticated” and required a certain amount of experience.
Gardaí said the operation was organised by senior associates of a jailed INLA boss.
Five people were arrested in the apartment. Some of them were known to the gardaí, while others had come across their “radar”, but did not have known links to the INLA.
Three of the men are from Dublin — including Tallaght and the inner city — while another man is from Belfast.
The fifth man is from the border/Monaghan region.
The men were detained under section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act and can be held for up to 72 hours.
Three men were taken to Blackrock Garda Station and two to Shankill Garda Station.
The scene has been preserved for technical examination by crime scene examiners from the Garda Technical Bureau.
Senior officers believe some of the bombs would have been used in a violent feud between the Dublin INLA unit and a drug trafficking gang in south Dublin. The rest would have been sold to criminal gangs, a trade that has increased in recent years.
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