Derry dissidents may split from New IRA over MI5 bugging operation – report

THERE is speculation that the Derry brigade of the New IRA may split from the terror group after a covert MI5 bugging operation led to the arrest of nine senior figures.

A report in today’s Irish News says the Derry leader of the New IRA is “furious” with the New IRA leadership after it allowed themselves to be penetrated at the highest level by an MI5 agent masquerading as a dissident republican cheerleader.

Scots-born Dennis McFadden has been unmasked as the MI5 mole. He had risen up the ranks of dissident republicanism and was the ‘logistics officer’ for the New IRA’s political wing Saoradh.

McFadden – branded a ‘traitor’ by dissident republicans – had rented out two properties for the leadership meetings of the New IRA which MI5 bugged with hi-tech cameras and listening devices.

As a result a total of ten people – eight men and two women – were charged with a variety of terrorist offences.

The arrests have dealt a major blow to the New IRA leaving the terror group wondering who else have the security services compromised within its ranks.

Police believe the leader of the New IRA in Derry is 44-year-old Thomas Ashe Mellon, a convicted dissident republican terrorist.

Mellon didn’t attend two meetings of the New IRA leadership in February and July this year as he had fallen out with senior figures in the terror group.

They were still angry with Mellon after his unit shot dead journalist Lyra McKee in Creggan April 2019 and he was said to be in a “huff” with them.

Two of Mellon’s trusted lieutenants in Derry – Gary Hayden and Joe Barr – attended the top level meetings in Tyrone which landed them with charges of membership of the New IRA and involvement in preparatory acts of terrorism.

According to the three-page report in today’s Irish News, Mellon temporarily resigned from the New IRA.

However, he was persuaded to return “after the leadership was told that the entire Derry unit backed him and was threatening to split away”.

A source close to the organisation told the newspaper: “He already had one foot out the door long before McFadden was outed.

“I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a split before the end of the year.”

In June this year, police in Derry recovered a gun found which was the weapon used to murder Lyra McKee.

The low calibre Hammeril X-Esse pistol had been stolen in a robbery in Fermanagh a number of years earlier before it ended up in the hands of violent dissident republicans.

A source told the newspaper that the decision to keep the weapons rather than dispose of it showed who little weaponry the New IRA had.

“There is f**k all left. The cupboard is bare,” the source was quoted as saying.

“The reputation for losing gear is as damaging as the s**t show over McFadden.

“It’s finished. Everyone knows it but no one will say it.”

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