Ahern to meet Omagh victim's father

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has agreed to a meeting with the father of a boy killed in the Omagh bombing after months of pressure, it was confirmed tonight.

He will have talks with Victor Barker, whose son James was killed in the 1998 Real IRA atrocity, in December.

By the time they meet details of the Nally Report into allegations the gardaí did not pass on to police in Northern Ireland all the intelligence information they had relating to planned Real IRA attacks ahead of Omagh, should be known.

A Government spokeswoman said Justice Minister Michael McDowell will be making a statement on the report in the Dáil in the coming weeks.

Mr Barker, who moved back to England from Co Donegal after the bombing, will be pressing for details of the Nally report and will question Mr Ahern’s comments in the Dáil denying that a Government minister had met with representatives of the Real IRA.

It emerged recently that Mr Ahern’s special adviser Dr Martin Mansergh had held discussions with representatives of the terror group in the aftermath of the Omagh bombing.

As he prepared for the December 10 meeting in Dublin, Mr Barker said: “In Britain for the Prime Minister to provide an answer to Parliament that the government had had no contact with a terrorist group and for it to then emerge that his special adviser did actually speak to that group, would be a resignation matter.

“Obviously, in the Dáil, it is not.”

He said he would be raising with Mr Ahern the actions of the gardaí in dealing with intelligence information relating to planned Real IRA attacks in Northern Ireland in 1998 and “their apparent failure to properly advise the RUC of such likely attacks”.

Meanwhile, filming of a drama about the bomb atrocity which claimed the lives of 29 people including the mother of unborn twins, is due to begin in weeks.

It is to be made by the same production team which made the award-winning Bloody Sunday and has the backing of the Omagh families.

Michael Gallagher, who is being played in the film by Omagh-born actor Gerard McSorley – he had a starring role in the recent film about murdered journalist Veronica Guerin – said the film was a “painful but important” recreation of events on August 15, 1998.

Mr Gallagher, who lost his teenage son Aidan in the bombing, said coming from Omagh means McSorley “knows what we are about“.

The film has been backed by RTE, Channel Four and the Irish Film Board.