Belfast bombing - Heinous bid to undo progress

Taoiseach Enda Kenny rightly condemned those responsible for the mindless bombing outside a busy Belfast restaurant on Friday night.

He was scathing about their depraved agenda. Politicians from both sides of the political divide — nationalists and unionists, along with Protestant and Catholic churchmen — united over the weekend in their condemnation of this heinous endangering of innocent people.

Those involved in the bombing gave a newspaper a 24-minute warning, which is an extremely short time at such a busy period of the year, especially in the midst of rush hour. Complicating matters further, the bomb was about 150m away from the place identified. This could have been a deliberate ploy so people would be cleared into the path of the bomb. It may even have been a perverted effort to blame the police clearing the area.