‘Tempo’ of Mi5-assisted PSNI operations against violent 'IRA' groups ‘high’

A senior police officer has said the ‘tempo’ of Mi5-assisted operations against violent republican groups opposed to the settlement under the Good Friday Agreement was ‘high’ last year.
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Assistant Chief Constable Mark McEwan told members of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee (NIAC) hundreds of searches have been conducted against both the ‘New IRA’, ‘Continuity IRA’ and other splinter groups.

"In the last financial year, the tempo was high for our operational activity. We have carried out 391 searches, 220 arrests and 178 charges or reports against organised crime groups.

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"Since April 2021, the Paramilitary Crime Task Force (PCTF) figures stand at 268 searches, 118 arrests and 111 charged or reported. Indeed, in the Terrorism Investigation Unit, against NIRA and CIRA in particular, we have had 156 searches, 111 arrests, 22 charges and 41 reports,” said ACC McEwan.

ACC Mark McEwanACC Mark McEwan
ACC Mark McEwan

“I outline that to give some sense of the scale of the task facing PSNI. I know we will focus particularly on paramilitary groups, which are primarily acted against by the Paramilitary Crime Task Force,” he told the NIAC’s ongoing enquiry into the effect of paramilitaries on society in the north.

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ACC McEwan said the PSNI continues to maintain a focus on violent republican groups.

“It is also important that we emphasise the work the PSNI is doing, along with partners in MI5 and others, in terms of terrorist groups that are still with us, particularly the New IRA, the Continuity IRA and ONH [Óglaigh na hÉireann].

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"If I may just give an idea of the scale of the task in front of PSNI, since its conception the Paramilitary Crime Task Force, which is what we will focus on today, has conducted 842 searches, 373 arrests, 323 charges or reports, and over 200 seizures of weapons and ammunition.

“That is over a five-year period since November 2017,” he stated.

The top police officer said the PSNI does not believe violent groups with a political motivation have the capacity to compete with organised crime gangs.

“We know that, as criminal groups, the paramilitaries tend not to be at the scale, complexity or capability of competing organised crime groups, but they do have that disproportionate control and harm effect in their communities, so it is something that we need to discuss,” he said.