The British Security Service (MI5) has over 700 officers - over 20% of its entire force - stationed in Northern Ireland, due to fears that the Brexit process could rekindle the historic conflict. In 1922, the nationalist rebels managed to remove Ireland from the British Empire. But six counties in Northern Ireland remained under British rule and today form the British territory of Northern Ireland. Irish nationalists have for decades engaged in an unsuccessful campaign - sometimes peaceful and sometimes violent - to unite these counties with the Republic of Ireland. Following the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, nationalist and British loyalist groups in Northern Ireland halted their armed operations and entered the political arena, effectively sharing power within British territory.
The integration of Ireland and Great Britain into the European Union contributed to this process effectively leading to an end to border controls between the two countries. Thus, pro-British loyalists continued to live under British rule, while nationalists were able to cross from Northern Ireland to the Irish Republic and back without restrictions, as if the two states were effectively unified.
But this relatively peaceful border regime is about to change when Britain leaves the European Union in March. Many fear that the reinstated border will remind nationalist communities in the North that the island of Ireland remains divided and thus rekindle secessionist sentiments. A few days ago, the London newspaper The Daily Mail quoted an unnamed "anti-terrorism source" as claiming that MI5, Britain's counter-terrorism agency, had deployed a fifth of its force in Northern Ireland. The agency is monitoring a number of dissident republican groups - a term used to describe armed groups of Irish nationalists who continue to push back the majority of the nationalist community in order to approve the Good Friday deal in 1998. One such group - which is commonly seen as the most formidable in existence today is the new self-constituted Irish Republican Army.
The new IRA was formed in 2012 when dissident republican cells joined another dissident nationalist group, known as the Real IRA. The new formation is particularly strong in the far northwest of Northern Ireland, which includes urban centers such as Derry. British security officials believe the New IRA is made up of some 40 members who are engaged in an armed campaign against British rule in the North.
Nearly 50 new IRA militants are currently serving sentences in British and Irish prison systems, while several raids on IRA members' residences and other properties have revealed the existence of automatic weapons and explosives. But the group managed to detonate a car bomb in Derry on January 19 this year. The bomb consisted of gas canisters and exploded about 30 minutes after an unidentified man called a nearby charity shop to issue a bomb warning. Police officers rushed to the scene and were present when the bomb went off. There were no injuries, according to local media reports.