Provos blast bridges

Press, 9 May 1980, Page 6

Provos blast bridges

NZPA-Reuter Belfast] Irish republican guerrillas have threatened to maintain a series of bomb attacks on the only cross-border rail link between Belfast and] Dublin. The Provisional Irish Re-: publican Army said bluntly] in a statement that people! on the trains would be ris-l king their lives in future. I The Provos’ warning came' shortly after bombs contain-] Ing more than half a tonne Of explosives destroyed two!

(bridges in Northern Ireland on the main Belfast to Dub-[ lin rail line near Newry in j County Down, ; The police believe the rai-I ders came from secret hide-* louts in the mountainous i South Armagh region known; ,as “bandit country” by se-| icurity forces in the area. | British soldiers surprised! I two bombers planting pow-| erful charges on one bridge] i but in the darkness the: I.R.A. men escaped over the; ■border to the Irish Republic. i

’! The explosions cut the] lline near an isolated cross-' ■ ing where the I.R.A. has {struck dozens of times in! ■ the past decade. | In the statement after the’ dawn attacks the I.R.A. said; (anyone travelling by train! ■across the border did so at! 'his or her own risk. ; . The I.R.A. said this warn-] ling covered passengers, re-! pair men who cleared up] 'after bombs, and train!

drivers who in the past have always been released uniharmed by the guerrillas I after their trains were hi--1 jacked on the border. Later a Provisional I.R.A. ibomb badly damaged a carltyre factory in Derry, 110 km inorth of Belfast. No-one was I injured. I The police said the bomb, (made up of petrol wired to (high explosive, was planted >by three armed and masked >men who held up security staff and robbed the company before running off to a waiting car.