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A number of IRA members had disagreed with the informant warned his Special Branch handlers that a
decision to declare a cease-fire, and they were dis- bombing was being planned somewhere in Northern
gusted at the Good Friday Accords, which required Ireland for August 15. It further alleges that a warning
the IRA to seek a political solution to the conflict was received by the RUC that a mortar attack on
through its representative political party, Sinn Féin. police headquarters in Omagh was also planned for
These members split with the group and formed a that date. The report implies that if these two pieces
competing organization, the Real IRA. of information had been given to local police, the
On August 15, 1998, members of the Real IRA are tragedy might have been averted. The victims’ fami-
believed to have driven from the Republic of Ireland lies have expressed outrage at these conclusions and
across the border to Omagh, County Tyrone, Northern calls have come from many quarters for reorganizing
Ireland. Omagh, a small town with a largely Catholic the Special Branch. One man, Republic of Ireland cit-
population, has long housed a British Army garrison. izen Colm Murphy, has been convicted in connection
Sometime early that morning, a 500-pound car bomb with the Omagh bombing.
was parked in the town’s market square, an area sure
See also CONTINUITY IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY; IRISH
to be crowded with shoppers, as that Saturday was the
REPUBLICAN ARMY; REAL IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY
final day of an annual town festival.
Around 2:30 P.M. a call was placed to Omagh’s Further Reading
police force warning them of a bomb; police believed
it was near the town’s courthouse, a building at the Holland, Jack. Hope Against History: The Course of
Conflict in Northern Ireland. New York: Henry Holt,
opposite end of the main street from the market square.
1999.
Police rushed to clear the area, tragically directing
McKittrick, David. Making Sense of the Troubles. Belfast:
people toward the market. Shortly after 3:00 P.M., the
Blackstaff, 2000.
car bomb exploded, utterly destroying two buildings
O’Brien, Brendan. The Long War: The IRA and Sinn Fein.
nearby. More than 200 people were injured, and 29 2nd ed. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1999.
were killed, one victim dying several months later of Taylor, Peter. Provos: The IRA and Sinn Fein. London:
his injuries. The dead included nine children and three Bloomsbury, 1997.
generations of one family.
The attack was the most deadly single bombing
in Northern Ireland and immediately put the peace OMEGA 7
accords into jeopardy. Although suspicion quickly fell
on the Real IRA, many Unionist politicians declared
that the IRA’s failure to disarm—its reluctance to do Omega 7 was an anticommunist Cuban terrorist
so had been a major obstacle throughout the peace group that engaged in more than 30 attacks against
process—had allowed the atrocity. Providing some Cuban-linked targets in the 1970s and 1980s.
reassurance about the IRA’s commitment to the peace The 1959 overthrow of Cuba’s Batista government
process, Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Féin, made by Fidel Castro and his Communist guerrillas initiated
an unprecedented declaration condemning the bomb- a massive exodus of refugees with links to the old
ings. Previously, the IRA’s position was that civilian regime. These exiles were welcomed in the United
deaths were regrettable but justified. In the days fol- States, where they have established large Cuban
lowing the bombing, the British Parliament passed enclaves in several cities, most visibly in Miami. The
harsh new antiterror laws that allowed suspects to U.S. government strongly opposed the Castro regime,
be convicted on the word of a senior police officer, and in the early 1960s began training a guerrilla force
and the Real IRA issued an apology for the bombing, with the intent of overthrowing the Communist gov-
insisting that civilians had not been the target. ernment. The 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion was a fiasco,
In December 2001, the ombudsman for Northern however, and the United States declined to involve
Ireland’s new security force, Nuala O’Loan, issued a itself in further military operations. By the early 1970s,
report severely criticizing the conduct of the Royal some members of the Cuban American community
Ulster Constabulary (RUC), in particular the officers had grown dissatisfied with only politically opposing
of its Special Branch, in the days before the bombing. Castro. With the support of the larger Cuban political
The report maintains that a highly regarded police organizations, a Cuban refugee named Eduardo