On February 22nd, a detective of the Crown was gunned down. in Omagh, County Tyrone. A typed message appeared on a wall in Londonderry, from the New IRA and claimed responsibility for Mr Caldwell’s attempted murder.
Despite arresting 13 people and conducting numerous searches, the police apparently are still have not retrieved significant evidence or information, and in desperation raised their information from £20,000 to £150,000.
The claim of responsibility read as follows:
The full name for the New IRA is the New Irish Republican Army – although its members describe it as simply the Irish Republican Army.
The organisation was dubbed the New IRA by the press after the Real IRA merged with Republican Action Against Drugs (RAAD) and other small militant groups in 2012.
In a statement at the time of the group’s formation signed off by the “IRA Army Council”, they explained Irish people had been “sold a phoney peace, rubber-stamped by a token legislature in Stormont”.
“The IRA’s mandate for armed struggle derives from Britain’s denial of the fundamental right of the Irish people to national self-determination and sovereignty,” it said.
The full founding statement of the IRA reads:
“Following extensive consultations, Irish republicans and a number of organisations involved in armed actions against the armed forces of the British crown have come together within a unified structure, under a single leadership, subservient to the constitution of the Irish Republican Army.
“The leadership of the Irish Republican Army remains committed to the full realisation of the ideals and principles enshrined in the Proclamation of 1916.
“In recent years the establishment of a free and independent Ireland has suffered setbacks due to the failure among the leadership of Irish nationalism and fractures within republicanism. The root cause of conflict in our country is the subversion of the nation’s inalienable right to self-determination and this has yet to be addressed. Instead the Irish people have been sold a phoney peace, rubber-stamped by a token legislature in Stormont.
“Non-conformist republicans are being subjected to harassment, arrest and violence by the forces of the British crown; others have been interned on the direction of an English overlord. It is Britain, not the IRA, which has chosen provocation and conflict.
“The IRA’s mandate for armed struggle derives from Britain’s denial of the fundamental right of the Irish people to national self-determination and sovereignty – so long as Britain persists in its denial of national and democratic rights in Ireland the IRA will have to continue to assert those rights.
“The necessity of armed struggle in pursuit of Irish freedom can be avoided through the removal of the British military presence in our country, the dismantling of their armed militias and the declaration of an internationally observed timescale that details the dismantling of British political interference in our country.
“Signed Army Council … IRA.”