'Shocking Attack' in Northern Ireland That Killed Journalist the Latest Incident of Escalating Violence

A journalist whose work focused on Northern Ireland’s troubled past was killed Thursday night in the latest in a series of militant escalations that are increasing in frequency as the United Kingdom and Ireland reckon with Brexit. 

Clashes broke out Thursday in the Northern Ireland city of Derry as police forces attempted to raid suspected militant homes. 

Lyra McKee was shot, allegedly by dissidents, during the violence. McKee died shortly thereafter. 

The raid came in advance of Easter Sunday, which has significance for Northern Irish republicans who want to reunify Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland and see the continued division of the island as a leftover from centuries of brutal British colonial rule. 

Reaction to McKee’s death from leaders on both sides of the Irish Sea stressed the importance of her work and the senselessness of the shooting. 

Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s Taoiseach (Prime Minister), issued a statement condemning the violence in the country to the north. 

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“We are all full of sadness after last night’s events,” said Varadkar. “We cannot allow those who want to propagate violence, fear, and hate to drag us back to the past.”

“My thoughts are with the family and loved ones of Lyra McKee, senselessly killed while doing her job as a journalist,” said Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. “This shocking attack is a reminder of the vital importance of protecting the Good Friday Agreement and Northern Ireland peace process.”

Michelle O’Neill, the deputy leader of the Irish party Sinn Féin, said she was “shocked and saddened” by the attack and hoped it would not reopen old wounds.

“The murder of this young woman is a human tragedy for her family,” said O’Neill, “but it is also an attack on all the people of this community, an attack on our peace process and an attack on the Good Friday Agreement.”

Thursday’s shooting is the third violent incident involving dissidents in four months. In January republican militants set off a car bomb outside a Derry courthouse. Two months later, another group of pro-unification dissidents sent at least four, and possibly five, bombs to locations across Britain. 

That’s a major escalation over recent years; Northern Ireland has been largely quiet since 2007. The country, which is one of four in the U.K., has gone through a generally peaceful spell of time since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which began to put an end to “The Troubles”—the Irish and Northern Irish name for the sectarian war that raged along the Northern Irish border for decades. 

A number of stressors, chief among them the political instability that comes from the U.K.’s ongoing Brexit struggles, may be to blame for the recent increase in violence.