Bomb scare at Justice Minister Helen McEntee's home roundly condemned
It is understood McEntee was not at home at the time but Gardaí moved her husband and children to safety as a precaution.
A bomb scare at Justice Minister Helen McEntee's house has been roundly condemned by politicians across the political divide.
A major investigation is underway after the threats were made on Wednesday night forcing her young family to have to be evacuated from their home in Co Meath. The minister was not at home at the time.
The threat was reportedly made from a location in Cork.
Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said what had happened to Ms McEntee and her young family was “disgusting”, and hit out at the “harassment” and “intimidation” of politicians.
“I think what’s going on is genuinely very sinister,” Mr Donnelly told reporters in Athlone. “And even in the lifetime of this government, we have seen a very sinister change in this country.”
Also referencing the protests outside the home of Minister Roderic O’Gorman, he said “arriving to anybody’s family home in balaclavas to my mind is a direct and overt threat to their safety".
Mr Donnelly said there should be no tolerance for such actions and those responsible should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
“Just a few kilometres from my own house, we saw well-organised, far-right wing people infiltrate what was a local peaceful protest,” he said. “I spoke to some of the locals, they were horrified at that these far right agitators arrived.
The health minister said social media is being used to organsie these actions, and Ireland needs to be awake to the fact that young people are being “radicalised” online.
Elsewhere, Labour TD Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said that the bomb threat to Ms McEntee was a “new low” in Irish politics. "I'm standing in the European elections at the moment, and what I'm coming across is an unprecedented level of anger, violent language, abuse, which is making a lot of political parties find it difficult to find candidates,” he told Newstalk radio.
Speaking at his party's Ard Fheis in Maynooth on Saturday, Aontú leader Peadar Tóibín said the security alert at the Justice Minister's home is an 'absolutely shocking' attack on democracy.
"There should be no space in our society for these kinds of threats," he added.
Sinn Féin TD Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire tweeted: "Nothing, absolutely nothing, can justify this, or the worry it would have caused her, her husband and 2 small children. There’s no excuse under the sun. Appalling."
