The IRA has denied it was involved in Monday's £22 million Northern Bank robbery in Belfast as police confirmed that they were within only three minutes of detecting the gang as they carried out the raid.
Last night police staged a limited reconstruction of the robbery in Belfast city centre in which they placed a Ford white van at the scene.
Despite the IRA denial, the PSNI said that the organisation, as well as four other paramilitary and organised crime gangs, remained the chief suspects, as they had the greatest capability to carry out such a complex robbery.
It emerged yesterday that, within minutes of the robbers' getaway, two uniformed police officers arrived at the Northern Bank in central Belfast to check a report of suspicious activity. They found nothing untoward, and no further action was taken at the time.
A 45-member police team led by Det Supt Andy Sproule will work around the clock through Christmas trying to apprehend the robbers and recover the £22 million haul of cash. Last night members of the team tried to track possible eyewitnesses to the raid by staging a partial reconstruction of Monday's robbery.
At lunchtime yesterday a senior republican source denied that the IRA had carried out Ireland's biggest robbery, in fact believed to be one of the world's biggest bank raids. "We are dismissing any suggestion or allegation that we were involved," the IRA source said.
The statement did not carry the P. O'Neill signature that fully and formally authorises IRA statements, but well-placed sources were certain that the terse statement originated from the IRA.
The Sinn Féin president, Mr Gerry Adams, was not available last night to comment on the IRA statement, but a Sinn Féin spokesman said: "Of course, Sinn Féin accepts what the IRA is saying, that it was not involved."
Det Supt Sproule nonetheless said the IRA was "very much part of our investigation. If a criminal gang, who we could have suspected was involved, issued a similar statement we would not necessarily take that on face value either.
"There are a number of gangs capable of doing [ the raid]. None of them has been ruled in or out at this stage," he added.
Det Supt Sproule confirmed last night that around the time of the robbery the PSNI received a report from a traffic warden about a suspicious van at Wellington Street, beside the bank, which is close to Belfast City Hall.
This was after a man and woman alerted traffic wardens at 8.10 p.m. on Monday in Belfast city centre. Three minutes later the police were alerted by telephone, while five minutes later two uniformed officers patrolled Wellington Street on foot.
At the same time CCTV of the area was checked. At that time "there was no van present", the PSNI reported.
This means, however, that had the warning been issued earlier or police managed to arrive more quickly, they could have caught the robbers as they were finishing loading a white van with the cash, their second multi-million haul of the night.
Det Supt Sproule, however, insisted that the police arrived as quickly as they could. "It was not a botched police investigation. I want to nail that," he said.
The van used in the raid - false registration RCZ 6632 - has still not been found. Police also appealed to the couple who alerted the traffic wardens on Monday evening to come forward.
Notwithstanding the IRA denial, the PSNI is still focusing on five groups - understood to be the IRA, dissident republicans, loyalist paramilitaries and two well-organised general criminal gangs - that had the capacity to carry out such a large-scale sophisticated operation.
Well-placed Dublin and Belfast sources accepted that at this stage police genuinely do not know who was responsible, despite claims by some unionist politicians such as Mr Ian Paisley jnr that it was the IRA.
