Series of searches conducted as part of New IRA investigation

Police carried out a raid on the Saoradh offices on Belfast's Antrim Road as part of an operation linked to the arrests of 9 people by security forces investigating the activities of the New IRA. File picture: Alan Lewis

A series of searches have been conducted in the North as part of a mounting cross-border investigation into the New IRA by the PSNI.

Nine people were being questioned by anti-terrorism officers as all four public offices of Saoradh, a political group linked to the New IRA, were searched on Thursday.

The nine arrests, made on Tuesday, marked the culmination of a surveillance operation thought to have been orchestrated by the British security service MI5.

Those arrests by the PSNI were part of a coordinated operation, code-named Arbacia, which saw six searches in the Republic.

While arrests were not part of the garda operation, they were trying to locate senior members, including a former Provisional IRA prisoner and bank robber.

Several sources have said that those arrested in the North include senior republican figures, many with paramilitary convictions.

Sources believe the PSNI is preparing to bring charges. If multiple charges are brought, sources believe it could be a major blow to the New IRA and to Saoradh.

The suspects's detention period ends on Saturday when they are back in court.

PSNI’s Crime Operations Assistant Chief Constable Barbara Gray said detectives searched properties in Belfast, Dungannon, Newry, and Derry "in connection with an ongoing investigation into the activities of the New IRA".

She said they were searched under terrorism legislation as part of Operation Arbacia. 

Sources said both the New IRA and Saoradh have been badly hit in the last year and a half, in terms of public outrage and defections, after the murder of 29-year-old journalist Lyra McKee in Derry in April 2019.