Politicians say that an attack that left a prison officer dead on a motorway in Northern Ireland was perpetrated by militant nationalists.
The prison officer was killed when he drove into a hail of bullets at high speed on a motorway and crashed.
It was the first murder of a prison officer since 1993 and the fifth fatal attack on a member of the security establishment since the 1998 Good Friday peace deal, which largely ended three decades of sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland.
More than 3,600 people were killed in Northern Ireland's 'Troubles' when Catholic nationalists seeking union with Ireland fought British security forces and mainly Protestant Loyalists determined to remain part of the United Kingdom.
