Suspected IRA Dissident Sentenced
VOA News
25 Jan 2002 13:46 UTC
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A Dublin court has sentenced a suspected Irish Republican Army dissident to 14 years in prison for his role in a 1998 car bomb attack that killed 29 people.

Colm Murphy is the only suspect charged so far in connection with the bombing in the Northern Ireland town of Omagh. More than 300 people were wounded by the blast. The court Tuesday found him guilty of conspiracy in the bombing, the bloodiest single attack in Northern Ireland's 30-year sectarian conflict.

The sentencing judge acknowledged that Murphy had not planted the bomb. But he said the court had accepted prosecution arguments that Murphy had lent two mobile telephones to another person knowing they would be used in carrying out the attack. The judge then called anyone involved in such a major atrocity guilty of a serious crime.

Police arrested the suspect in February 1999 in Dundalk, a town in the Irish Republic, just south of the Northern Ireland border. An Irish Republican Army dissident group that calls itself the Real IRA claimed responsibility for the attack.

The Real IRA opposes a 1998 truce signed by Northern Ireland's main Protestant and Catholic parties. It contends that the agreement cements British rule over the disputed province.

Some information for this report provided by AP and Reuters.

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