Ireland is to get a new daily newspaper, it was confirmed today.
The newspaper, under the working title of Ireland Today, will be published by the Andersonstown News Group, which also publishes the Irish language daily Láthe bi-weekly Andersonstown News, North Belfast News, and the South Belfast News.
Ireland Todaywill be targeted at nationalist readers across the 32 counties and will come into direct competition with the Irish News. The enterprise is expected to create over 40 jobs at offices in Belfast and Monaghan
"This is a wonderful business opportunity," said Andersonstown News managing director Máirtín O Muilleoir. "This new title will be a dynamic, quality newspaper that will help to sustain and build the strongly pro-nationalist community in the Northern counties of Ireland.
Mr Ó Muilleoir said the paper planned to take a share of the large adverstising market in the south and also hoped to take advantage of the £70 million spent on advertising in the North every year.
The Belfast publishing group is also involved in the new Dublin papers, Lucan Gazetteand Blanch Gazetteand prints the South Armagh paper The Examiner.