Police blamed Irish nationalist militants for bomb attacks on the homes of police officials on Wednesday near the city of Londonderry. They did not say who was to blame for Friday’s attack.
The bomb was thrown at a police patrol as they responded to an alarm call at a toy store shortly after midnight. The officers’ injuries are not thought to be life-threatening. Two members of the store’s staff were treated for shock.
Officials have said that armed Irish nationalist militants opposed Britain’s presence in Northern Ireland are more active than at any time since a 1998 peace deal. But they lack the wider community support the Irish Republican Army had during three bloody decades known as “the troubles.”
The 1998 agreement paved the way for a power-sharing government bringing together Protestant loyalists who want Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom, and
Catholic Irish nationalists who want it to be part of a united Ireland.
