A massive car bomb in Belfast that failed to explode properly was designed to cause widespread destruction, police said Sunday, underscoring the threat posed by dissident groups to Northern Ireland's fragile peace.
The vehicle was driven Saturday onto the grounds of the headquarters of the supervisory Northern Ireland Policing Board, but its deadly cargo of explosives failed to go off properly, Northern Ireland police chief Matt Baggott said.
Two people were seen fleeing before the car burst into flames, but failed to blow up.
"It does appear to be a device that has partially exploded, with around 400 pounds" or 180 kilogrammes of explosives inside, Baggott said. "It is a reckless act -- not just in doing damage but also the potential loss of life."
In a separate incident on Saturday, police in Northern Ireland and the Irish republic arrested a total of three people after an exchange of gunfire with suspected republican paramilitaries in a border village.
Northern Ireland -- torn by sectarian strife for three decades -- has been largely peaceful since the Good Friday agreement in 1998 led to power sharing between the province's Protestant majority and Catholic minority.
But the killings of two British soldiers and a police officer in March this year -- the first of their kind in about a decade -- underscored the lingering threat posed by dissident groups.
"Very clearly these people are trying to undermine the progress that has been made in Northern Ireland in recent years," said Britain's minister for Northern Ireland affairs, Paul Goggins, reacting to Saturday's car bomb.
"When attacks like these happen, it brings people together with the strong message that these dissidents will not succeed," he said. "They are a small minority, they are reckless and criminally intent."
Baggott, the police chief, said: "We have said from day one that the terrorist situation is severe. We have substantial resources being put into investigating and thwarting these attacks."
"This attack is an attack on the well-being of everybody in Northern Ireland. This is not about an attack on policing or the policing board, this is an attack on young people and young people's future."
This weekend's incidents come at a delicate time, as the main Protestant and Catholic parties are at loggerheads over when responsibility for policing and justice -- now in London's hands -- should revert to the province.
Earlier this month, the Independent Monitoring Commission said the danger posed by militant splint groups was "very serious".
Giving details of Saturday's failed attack, a police spokeswoman said the car crashed through the barriers of the policing board headquarters at Clarendon Dock -- in the heart of Belfast harbour where the Titantic was built -- at around 7.10 pm (1910 GMT).
"A short time later at around 7.40 pm, a small explosion occurred within the vehicle as the area was being evacuated," she said.
"Had this device functioned as the terrorists planned, there would certainly have been widespread damage and destruction.
"It is also very probable that this 'no warning' device would have led to very serious injury or loss of life, as a number of police officers were trying to evacuate the area when the device exploded."
