A senior off-duty police officer is in critical condition after being shot in Northern Ireland in what politicians condemned as a “shameful” attack by “terrorists” and a chilling reminder of the region’s violent past.
Detective Chief Inspector John Caldwell had been putting footballs into the boot of his car after a coaching session at a youth club in Omagh, County Tyrone, on Wednesday night, when two men approached and shot him at point-blank range.
Caldwell’s young son was by his side at the time, Mark McEwan, assistant chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, told BBC Radio Ulster.
No one claimed responsibility for the shooting, but McEwan said police believed the New IRA, a dissident republican group, was responsible.
Caldwell ran away but fell and the attackers fired more shots at him on the ground before fleeing in a car, McEwan said. The officer was rushed to hospital and remains in critical but stable condition, he added.
The attack took place as London and Brussels seek to clinch a deal on Brexit trade rules for Northern Ireland that some activists have warned could destabilise a region where the dispute has paralysed local politics since last May.
It came just over a month before the 25th anniversary of the peace deal that ended three decades of violence in Northern Ireland, known as the Troubles, when the IRA fought to end British rule of the region and loyalist paramilitaries battled to remain part of the UK.
Children who witnessed the shooting, which took place at about 8pm, left the area in tears.
The attack, which stunned locals, was condemned by all political parties in Northern Ireland, as well as the UK and Irish prime ministers. Omagh was the site of the single biggest atrocity of the Troubles, a 1998 bombing that killed 29 people, and the last fatal shooting of a police officer in Northern Ireland, in 2011.
“It’s absolutely diabolical what’s happened here. It’s utterly unacceptable,” said Mary Lou McDonald, leader of the nationalist Sinn Féin party. Her party, mouthpiece of the IRA during the Troubles, now condemns such violence and won last year’s Northern Irish elections.
Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, leader of the Democratic Unionist party, said: “These terrorists have nothing to offer and they must be brought to justice.”
Colum Eastwood, leader of the smaller nationalist Social Democratic and Labour party, called the attack “a chilling reminder of the horrifying violence that criminal gangs are willing to visit on the people of Northern Ireland”.
UK prime minister Rishi Sunak said he was “appalled” by the shooting. “My thoughts are with the officer and his family. There is no place in our society for those who seek to harm public servants protecting communities.”
Naomi Long, leader of the Alliance party, said it was an “evil act of cowardice”, while Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s taoiseach, condemned “this grotesque act of attempted murder”.
Leaders of the region’s five main political parties — Sinn Féin, the DUP, Alliance, the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP — on Thursday issued a rare joint statement, in which they said they stood “united in our outright condemnation of this attack”.
A year ago, London lowered the security threat in Northern Ireland to “substantial” from “severe”, the first time it had been reduced in a dozen years.
Liam Kelly, chair of the Police Federation for Northern Ireland, told the BBC that the attack was a “stark reminder that . . . policing in Northern Ireland is still a very dangerous occupation”.
