On the evening of Saturday 7 March 2009, two soldiers were shot dead, and two others were seriously injured by gunmen. In total, six people were injured during the attack.
Gunmen Open Fire on Soldiers
The attack happened at the Massereene army base in Country Antrim, Northern Ireland. The base is located 16 miles to the north of Belfast. According to The Sunday Times, two soldiers were thought to have taken delivery of takeaway pizzas when the gunmen pulled up alongside in a vehicle and opened fire. The attack happened at around 9:40pm, on the outskirts of the town where the base is located. The two men delivering the pizzas were wounded as well as two others. Every Saturday night, large numbers of takeaways are delivered to the base, which the gunmen are likely to have known.
The soldiers are the first to have been killed in Northern Ireland for twelve years.
According to The Independent, on Sunday 8 March 2009, the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA), claimed responsibility for the shootings. Journalist Suzanne Breen said that a male caller contacted her with a designated key word, claiming responsibility for the attack and stating that it was the RIRA. The caller said that they made no apology for the killing of British soldiers as long as they were occupying Northern Ireland.
The Real Irish Republican Army
The RIRA are the group responsible for the Omagh bombing in 1998 which caused the deaths of 29 people and wounded over 200 others. It was the deadliest attack during the troubles in Northern Ireland. In recent months, security forces have foiled a number of terrorist plans which may have been planned by the RIRA, including the defusing of a 300lb car bomb in Castlewellan, County Down in February 2009.
Since the Omagh bombing, the RIRA has split into a number of factions after a row between to high-ranking members of the group. It resulted in severe divisions within the organisation and the formation of an number of different factions.
The attack came 36 hours after the chief constable of the police in Northern Ireland, Sir Hugh Orde, raised the threat level to "severe". He said that the threat level to British military and security personnel was the highest it had been for a decade.
The soldiers that were involved in the shootings, were members of the 38 Engineers Regiment, and were due to fly out to Afghanistan the next morning.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown has visited the military base to show support and give his condolences.
