Fire Service Clear Border Bomb Area

Firemen have saved many people from injuries by evacuating people from the scene of a terrorist bomb at a PSNI station.

However, the explosion still left two people hurt by the blast, in Newtownhamilton, Co Armagh at 11.25pm.

The PSNI were initially warned of the situation in an anoymous call to a Belfast hospital about an hour earlier, which said that a vehicle had been abandoned.

Officers were en route to the station, which is staffed on a part-time basis, when the explosion happened.

The two people's injuries are not life-threatening. Shots are also reported to have been fired before the explosion.

The two people who were treated in hospital - a man and an elderly woman - are said to have been left "extremely shaken".

The Acting Chair of the Northern Ireland Policing Board, Brian Rea, condemned the bomb attack on Newtownhamilton Police Station late last night.

"This is the second attack on Newtownhamilton police station in less than two weeks and I strongly condemn the people who caused such destruction to the local community.

"It was a cowardly and contemptible act carried out by people who have no thought for the safety of others and it was a miracle that no-one was killed or seriously injured," he said.

"Northern Ireland is moving forward and these people, who are intent on dragging us back to the past, have nothing positive to contribute. I would urge anyone with information about this incident to contact the police immediately."

The Justice Minister David Ford has also condemned last night's car bomb attack.

"This was not just an attack on the people of Newtownhamilton, but on the wider political process and it will be condemned across the community.

"With the progress that has been made in Northern Ireland, people will be asking who are Dissident Republicans fighting now?

"Are they fighting the notion of self government on a scale never seen before in Northern Ireland?

"Are they fighting representatives from across this community who form the Northern Ireland Executive or are they fighting the people from all parts of the community who make up the police service?" he asked.

"Those who planted this bomb want to drag Northern Ireland back to the dark days of murder and mayhem, they want to undermine the political process, they want politics to fail.

"I am determined that we will all continue to stand together so that they will not succeed."

Local MP Conor Murphy said: "There is little doubt that this bomb is the work of one of the small militarist factions.

"These people are opposed to the peace process and have no strategy to bring about political change or deliver Irish unity.

"This bomb sends a message that the peace process needs to be defended. People across the North will have the chance to do exactly that on May 6th," said the Sinn Fein man.

"People in South Armagh do not support these actions and will be angered at the disruption that this will bring to the local community."

Meanwhile, police are continuing to probe an earlier, unconnected pipe bomb explosion, behind a house in Coalisland in Co Tyrone.

A man and a woman were in their home on Chestnut Hill in Brackaville when the device went off at about the same time on Thursday astne border bomb blast.

Neither person was injured, but a number of windows were damaged. It was the fifth pipe bomb attack in the west of Northern Ireland this week.

On Wednesday night a pipe bomb exploded outside a house in Limavady, County Londonderry.

(BMcC/GK)