Emergency anti-terrorism legislation has been renewed for another year because of "no substantial change in circumstances" since the Omagh bombing in 1998, the Dáil has been told.
Minister of State for Labour Affairs Mr Frank Fahey said the Garda authorities believed it was necessary to renew the provisions sections of the Offences Against the State (Amendment) Act 1998 for another year, because of the "current terrorist threat, in the form of both the 'Real IRA' and Continuity IRA.
"The regrettable reality is that those responsible for the Omagh bomb continue to pursue and plan a campaign of violence and there is not substantive change in the circumstances which led to the enactment of the 1998 Act."
However, Sinn Féin's justice spokesman, Mr Aengus Ó Snodaigh, called the legislation a "trawling exercise" and said only one person had been charged through its provisions. Green Party and Independent TDs also said the Government had failed to make the case for its retention.
But Mr Fahey, standing in for the Minister and Minister of State for Justice who were on EU business, stressed that "there can be no ambivalence about the need for a continuation of this legislation. We either support it or we do not". The 'Real IRA' and Continuity IRA "arrogate to themselves the right to kill and maim in the name of Ireland and a nation who have repeatedly rejected their path of violence".
Under the terms of the Act the Oireachtas has to renew the emergency provisions every 12 months. Mr Fahey said there were those "who would do everything in their power to subvert the peace process through violence".
Fine Gael's justice spokesman, Mr Jim O'Keeffe, said the provisions should be renewed because of Omagh and because "the murderous people who perpetrated that dreadful crime are unfortunately still around".
Dissident republican groups were increasingly referred to but this ignored the "continuing activity of the Provisional IRA. They have not gone away, you know", he said.
Labour's spokesman, Mr Joe Costello, said the party would expect actions to be taken on the review of the Offences Against the State Act before the Oireachtas considered the legislation again next year. The review "deals with important issues of civil liberties and the entitlements of those in a democratic State".
Mr Ó Snodaigh said it was a "trawling exercise and is arresting people", and it was "not working, cannot work and is not even being used, but rather is being abused because people are not being charged under it".
Mr Joe Higgins (Socialist, Dublin West) said the legislation "goes way beyond any specific act of terror", and "it potentially criminalises a wide range of innocent activities, turns on its head the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty and attacks a whole range of basic civil rights".
Mr Dan Boyle (Green, Cork South-Central) said the Government, the Minister and the report on its use in the past 12 months, had failed to "show the essence of the threat that exists, why there is a need for the continuation of this emergency legislation and the reason the Bill, passed in 1998, has utterly failed to address the continuing needs of the victims and relatives of victims of the Omagh bombing to get justice for themselves and their families".
