Bomb left outside Derry police station confirmed as ‘viable’

A suspected car bomb driven to a police station in Derry over the weekend was “viable”, police have confirmed.

A delivery driver was forced at gunpoint to take what was previously believed to be an elaborate hoax to the police station in the city’s Waterside on Sunday.

On Wednesday morning, the Police Service of Northern Ireland said further tests carried out on the device show it was a “viable explosive device”.

PSNI assistant chief constable Bobby Singleton said the development “further underlines the reckless and callous disregard by those responsible for the safety of the driver, the local community and the police officers who serve them.”

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“Following further technical examination of the object recovered from a hijacked vehicle outside Waterside Police Station on Sunday evening, police can now confirm it was a viable explosive device,” he said.

The security alert forced the closure of roads and a primary school while homes were evacuated. Access to the nearby Altnagelvin Hospital was also impacted. An “obvious line of inquiry” was that dissident republicans were responsible, police said at the time.

Police also believe the New IRA was behind an attack on two police officers in Strabane, Co Tyrone, on Friday. A bomb was detonated at the side of a police vehicle while the officers, who were not injured, were on patrol in the town. Four men were arrested in connection with the attack and later released.

In the Derry incident, a delivery driver’s car was hijacked by three masked men at about 10.30pm on Sunday in the Curryneirin. A bomb was placed in the back of his car and the man was told to drive to the Waterside police station, where he was forced at gunpoint to abandon the vehicle. He was then able to raise the alarm.

Foyle MP and SDLP leader Colum Eastwood said a new Ireland will never be built while dissident republican groups remain active.

“The people who carried out this attack are acting against the will and the wishes of our community,” he said. “They are targeting PSNI officers but their fight is with the people of our city who have chosen to live in peace. They will never win that fight.

“Nobody in Derry or anywhere on this island wants to see violence or bloodshed and we need to see these people taken off the streets. We will never build a new Ireland until these groups leave the stage once and for all, they only serve to disgrace the cause they claim to support.”