Two Blasts Overnight In Ireland
Three men were hurt in an explosion in the center of the seaside town of Bangor on Monday, hours after an overnight blast in Belfast caused damage but no injuries.
The three injured men were riding in a van that was rocked by an explosion as they drove up a main street. The cause of the blast was not known.
Earlier, at about 2 a.m., an explosion shook Belfast's Shankill Road, at the heart of the city's Protestant community. There were no reports of injuries, but the blast at the office of the organization Loyalist Prisoners' Aid caused "substantial damage," a Royal Ulster Constabulary spokeswoman said.
A spokesman said no further details of the second blast were immediately available but unconfirmed media reports said one man had been injured.
"There was an explosion in High Street, Bangor, around 10:30 this morning near a vehicle," said a spokesman for the Royal Ulster Constabulary police force.
Loyalist Prisoners' Aid represents former prisoners linked to the Ulster Defense Association, a pro-British paramilitary group.
A violent feud between the UDA and the rival Ulster Volunteer Force has been blamed for three deaths, the shooting of an 11-year-old girl and a number of beatings and attacks on homes in the last month. Some 170 families have been forced from their homes in the Shankill area.
No group claimed responsibility for the latest explosions.
On Sunday, a home for the elderly was evacuated while army bomb-disposal experts defused an improvised bomb in the Shankill area, police said.
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