Editorial: The essential truth of the Omagh bomb has always been clear - it was an Irish republican terrorist atrocity

The Omagh bomb, which happened 25 years ago yesterday, has been described as the worst single incident of the Troubles.

​In a sense, though, this is wrong, because by many definitions the Troubles ended with he Belfast Agreement of April 1998. The Omagh attack happened that summer and was carried out by the worst defectors from the Provisional IRA: vile mass murderers including Michael McKevitt, Colm Murphy and Seamus McKenna.

None of these barbarians faced proper justice for their heinous crime, with McKevitt getting a trifling 20 year sentence for directing terrorism and then serving an insulting 13 years before he was released to live five more years and die a free man, unlike the 29 people he slaughtered including a mother of unborn twins, six teenagers, six children and two Spanish tourists.

As if this atrocity, in a long tradition of Irish republican bombs which caused such carnage, for example in the Enniskillen blast, was not bad enough, the blame soon subtly shifted to the RUC – that outstanding police force which did so much to save life and help maintain some stability during the long years of terror.

Now, in a development so foolish as to be contemptible, the UK government has set up an inquiry into Omagh that is likely to hone a perception that failures by the police were the key factor in the massacre. For years the UK should have acted unilaterally to balance the shameful legacy focus on UK state forces who prevented civil war by launching probes into republicans. Instead it launches one into allegations against those same state forces.

Yesterday President Michael D Higgins offered his “support for the relatives’ quest for the truth as to what happened on that day”. He didn’t mention words such as ‘Irish republican’ or ‘terrorist’ which take you to the obvious truth of that dreadful day.