Northern Ireland police say they are “preparing for the worst” after receiving strong intelligence of a terror attack ahead of U.S. President Joe Biden’s visit.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) confirmed it had received credible information that dissident republicans were planning significant violence on Easter Monday, a day before Biden’s highly-anticipated visit to the province.
Officers are now being moved to frontline duties, on longer shifts, to counter any potential threats, PSNI Chief Constable Simon Byrne said on Thursday.
The policing strategy, that has not been used “in years,” reflected the “exceptional circumstances” ahead of the Easter weekend, Byrne added.
The U.S. president will visit Belfast on Tuesday to mark the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, the Northern Ireland peace deal that brought an end to 30 years of violence.
He is due to travel on to the Republic of Ireland on Wednesday where he is expected to attend events in Dublin, County Louth and County Mayo, the White House confirmed on Wednesday.
MI5 recently raised the terrorism threat level in Northern Ireland to severe, meaning an attack is highly likely.
This followed the attempted murder of senior PSNI detective John Caldwell in County Tyrone, who remains in a critical but stable condition over a month on from the gun attack.
Easter Fears
Speaking at a PSNI press conference in Belfast on Thursday afternoon, Assistant Chief Constable Bobby Singleton said: “It’s going to be a really significant weekend for the PSNI.“There is also very strong community intelligence specifically coming forward in respect of Monday’s events in Derry/Londonderry and a real concern that there may be attempts to draw police in to serious public disorder and to use that then as a platform to launch terrorist attacks on police as well.”
“So going into our operation that’s something that is very clearly right at the forefront of my mind, the minds of the commanders that will be delivering that and of course our officers as well.”
Dissident republicans traditionally mark the anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising rebellion against British rule on Easter Monday.
Parades are set to take place in the nationalist areas of Rosemount and Creggan, while a commemoration in the city cemetery will also be held.
Violence has flared at similar events in the past, which have included masked men dressed in military combat gear.
Nine members of the dissident political group are currently facing terrorism charges after being arrested in Aug. 2020 in the joint MI5 and PSNI-led Operation Arbacia.
The Easter Monday events in Derry fall on April 10, exactly 25 years after the historic peace accord was signed.
Public Concern
Singleton said that while dissident republican intent to kill police officers remained the same, he said officers were concerned they may use public disorder in Derry as a platform to launch attacks.“The intent remains the same. I think as I see it, it’s the risk, it’s the platform potentially, in particular, that public disorder may present,” he said.
“We don’t have to go too far back, sadly, to see precisely that kind of scenario playing out in Derry/Londonderry in the past.”
In April 2019, journalist Lyra McKee was shot dead in Derry’s Creggan estate while observing dissident republican disorder ahead of the Easter weekend.
When asked whether guns or explosives could be used to target police, Singleton said police were “prepared for all eventualities on Monday.”
Speaking in Belfast, Irish Deputy Premier Micheal Martin condemned the threat of a terrorist attack as “criminality in its worst form” and said it was “very evil people who are contemplating this.”
“I would condemn any attempts by anybody to injure or to attack the PSNI,” Martin said on Thursday.
“An attack on the PSNI is an attack on all of us on this island.”
‘Preparing for the Worst’
Briefing the Northern Ireland Policing Board in Belfast, Byrne laid out policing plans to deal with the terror threat.“In policing terms we have initiated what we call Operation Inspire level four,” he said.
“What that means is that in some cases operational officers across the service have moved to 12-hour shifts and officers in a number of non-frontline roles will move to support the collective effort to focus on preventing further terrorist outrage and actually increasing our patrol visibility across the country.
“This is the first time in a number of years we have had to activate this plan.”
The chief constable said the move was a reflection of the “quite difficult and exceptional circumstances” facing police.
The plan will remain in place for around 10 days—including during Biden’s visit—before it’s reviewed.
PSNI Assistant Chief Constable Chris Todd said there was no specific intelligence that the anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement was acting as an additional motivation for dissident republicans to launch attacks.
“We plan for the worst and we hope for the best to be quite frank, we will respond to the intelligence as it develops, we have no such intelligence that would support that at the moment,” he said.
