Police update NI leaders on bomb

April 3, 2011 was last updated on 22 : 56 ET Constable Ronan Kerr was killed when a booby trap bomb Northern Irish political leaders will meet Chief Constable Matt Baggott in Belfast later to discuss the murder of Catholic policeman Ronan Kerr.

He will update them on the research and the efforts to Catholics are not deterred from participating in the police.

The 25-year-old constable was killed by a booby trap bomb under his car exploded in Omagh on Saturday.

No group has said it carried out the attack but police believe that dissident Republicans are debt.

So far no arrest made.

Political orientation

Correspondent of the BBC in Belfast Ireland Mark Simpson says that by killing of a young Catholic policeman dissident Republicans were hoping to stir up old political contradictions but instead politicians in Northern Ireland had stood together.

First Minister Peter Robinson, Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness and Minister of Justice David Ford will have a meeting with Chief Constable Baggott.

The dead policeman's mother Nuala Kerr has called on Catholics to hold accession to and support of the police, saying they did not want her son to die in vain.

Mrs Kerr said: "it is a sad day for our community. Ronan was a valued member and he had so much to offer.

"This is at a time when we strive for a neutral police for the well-being of our country and I urge all Catholic members not to be deterred.

"We all must stand up and be counted and to strive for equality."

Police appeal

The murder of Constable Kerr is widely condemned by political leaders in Northern Ireland and in the rest of the United Kingdom.

Chief Constable Baggott has said that the attack was carried out by a "powerful and dangerous minority".

Nuala Kerr: "he had all the characteristics of a large police officer"

He said police needed to speak to residents in the Highfield area of Omagh, where the bomb exploded.

"We need to know what they saw and what they heard in the past few days," he said.

Constable Kerr joined the police in May 2010 and had worked in the community since December.

He was the second officer to be killed because the police service of Northern Ireland was formed in 2001 out of the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

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