Dissident group claims UK bomb attack

A dissident Irish group calling itself the IRA said on Monday that it was responsible for the attempted murder of a prison officer in Northern Ireland.

The group, also referred to as the New IRA (Irish Republican Army), says it planted a bomb under the officer's van in east Belfast, the BBC reported.

The 52-year-old – who has not been identified – suffered serious injuries when a bomb exploded under his van on Friday morning.

The IRA says he was targeted for training officers at Maghaberry Prison near Lisburn in County Antrim.

Three men, aged 34, 41 and 45, and a 34-year-old woman have been arrested.

Police said the device partially exploded when the prison officer, a father of three, drove over a speed ramp in Hillsborough Drive.

He is in a stable condition in hospital.

In a statement to the BBC, the group said he was one of a number of prison officers on a list of "potential targets".

They claimed he was targeted because he was responsible for training prison officers who work in a wing housing dissident republicans at Maghaberry prison.

A spokesman for the group said last week's attack was the result of an ongoing dispute between dissidents and the prison authorities about their treatment in the prison.

The same dissident organisation shot dead prison officer David Black as he drove to work at Maghaberry in November 2012.

On Friday, police in Northern Ireland warned militants were planning to launch attacks marking the 100th anniversary of Ireland's Easter Rising against British rule, a revolt which paved the way for Irish independence, AFP reported.

On Saturday, police found two separate explosive devices they described as "viable" on residential streets in predominantly Catholic and nationalist west Belfast.

And on Sunday, another was found in Londonderry, Northern Ireland's second-biggest city, the report added.

Some 3,500 people were killed during a mostly sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted more than three decades and pitched groups of Catholics and nationalists, who wanted Northern Ireland to become part of Ireland, against pro-British Protestants and unionists.

Much of the violence was brought to an end by the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement that created a power-sharing coalition in the province.

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