Derry car bomb plot - four are quizzed

Four men were being questioned tonight by detectives on either side of the border about a huge car bomb seized in Derry.

As dissident republicans threatened new violence, it emerged that the van used to transport the 1,200lb fully primed device was bought two days before the foiled attack.

Security sources also confirmed that police swooped following a major intelligence operation.

One said: “We have had information for some time that dissident republicans were planning a big attack in the area.”

Police believe the Real IRA, the group behind the Omagh atrocity, planned to detonate the massive bomb at Waterside station in the city.

The four suspects were taken in hours after the red Hiace Van was abandoned on the Cloony Road, close to Foyle Bridge, on Sunday.

Two men, aged 33 and 24, were arrested by the Police Service of Northern Ireland in the Creggan area of Derry as gardai across the border in Co Donegal questioned another pair, in their early 20s, from the Buncrana area.

The failed attack came just days after the Garda intercepted a 500lb bomb in Co Louth that was destined for Northern Ireland.

Within the past 12 months Real IRA attacks in Belfast, Derry and Dublin have all been foiled amid growing suspicions that the rogue organisation has been heavily infiltrated by informers.

The 1,200lb device was three times larger than the bomb used in the August 1998 Real IRA attack on Omagh, which killed 29 people and unborn twins.

Sources close to the terror organisation said there would be no let up in its campaign.

One said: “To doubt our sincerity, our determination, would be rather stupid.”

The scale of the bomb pointed to a new determination to intensify the terror campaign, it was claimed.

“The size is indicative of where it was going,” one dissident republican said.

“People make this big thing about how the Provisional IRA were this and that, but the so-called dissidents are every bit as determined as they were in their day when they were functional.

“There is a lot of expertise there. Maybe it’s time people sat up and took notice.”

The city’s district police commander, Dawson Cotton, attacked the bombers for threatening mass carnage.

He said: “We are talking about wreaking havoc and loss of life.

“There was 1,200lbs of explosives. This was a fully functioning device, it was not explosives in transit.”

Chief Superintendent Cotton confirmed: “This van was in the possession of the terrorists from Friday. It was purchased.”

Annie Courtney, an independent nationalist councillor in Derry, said police had not chanced on the bomb.

“This was probably down to undercover surveillance. It was seized early in the morning so police must have known something was going to happen.”