Elite undercover squad uses tactics learned in Iraq war to catch rogue Republicans

Published on Friday 6 March 2009 21:02

AN ELITE, hand-picked team of undercover soldiers is mounting a 24-hour surveillance operation on dissident Republicans intent on carrying out terror attacks in Northern Ireland, it was disclosed yesterday.

The squad, from the Special Reconnaissance Regiment, is using round-the-clock communications intercept tactics currently deployed on enemy targets in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The decision by Sir Hugh Orde, Northern Ireland's chief constable, to call in the half-dozen specialist Signal Intelligence (Sigint) officers to support police has prompted an outcry from nationalist politicians.

But Sir Hugh defended the move yesterday, claiming the team's expertise was needed in the battle against dissidents.

He also rejected the notion it represented the return of special forces operations synonymous with the SAS during the Troubles.

"This is a very small number, a handful of people coming in with technical expertise I don't have, to enhance the front-line capabilities of my officers," he said. "The idea that there will be SAS walking around with machine-guns, as some people have tried to portray, is rubbish.

"They are offering support of a purely technical nature.

"I am not doing anything any other chief constable in the United Kingdom wouldn't do to help his officers tackle a specific threat.

"They will support my officers in keeping communities safe and keeping dissident Republicans under the cosh."

Republican extremists opposed to the peace process have launched a series of failed murder attempts against police officers in the past 18 months and in January abandoned a 300lb car bomb in the County Down village of Castlewellan.

This week, MI5 raised the dissident threat level to "severe", while Sir Hugh said the potential for attack was greater than at any time in his seven years in the job.

The Sigints will focus their work in the border counties of Fermanagh, Derry and Tyrone, where the majority of dissident incidents have taken place.

Going under a variety of names, including the Real IRA, Oglaigh na hEireann, Continuity IRA and the INLA, police do not believe the factions are well supported or organised.

However, the lethal cargo packed into the car left near a school in Castlewellan, and a rocket attack on a police patrol in County Fermanagh last year, proves they have the potential to inflict serious destruction.

The Sigint officers, who arrived in the province this week, are deploying the latest surveillance technology to monitor the activities of the dissidents.

One security expert said the soldiers were not directly involved in front-line operations. "These aren't the guys who kick down the doors," he said. "They provide the information to the guys who do."

Sir Hugh is to meet members of his oversight body – the Northern Ireland Policing Board – next week to address criticism levelled at him from Sinn Fein and SDLP members. They are angered at the prospect of undercover soldiers returning two years after the army officially ended operations in the province and that the board had not been given prior notice.

Martin McGuinness, the Sinn Fein deputy first minister, called the move stupid and dangerous. "The history of the north has shown that many of these forces have been as much a danger to the community as any other group," he said.

INTELLIGENCE SPECIALISTS

THE Specialist Reconnaissance Regiment is a special forces unit which was founded in 2004 to combat international terrorism.

Believed to be based in Hereford, the regiment was formed around an existing group of intelligence officers with experience of counter-terrorism in Northern Ireland.

Little is publicly known about the regiment but its members were allegedly involved in the intelligence gathering effort which led to the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes in July 2005. Agents from the regiment are also believed to be active in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2005 it was reported that two captured SRR undercover agents in Basra were freed in a military rescue operation.