About 500 people, family, friends and relatives of the 33 people killed and the hundreds maimed and injured in the Dublin-Monaghan bombings of May 1974, attended a wreath-laying ceremony at the scene of the car-bomb in Monaghan town centre yesterday.
This was the first occasion in the 26 years since the atrocities that the joint Dublin-Monaghan group, Justice for the Forgotten, had marked the anniversary in the town, where seven died and many more were injured. Another 26 people died in Dublin.
After a short ceremony, a Presbyterian minister, the Rev Walter Heron, said a brief prayer as the families laid wreaths at the small plaque which marks the spot where the car-bomb exploded. The attendance then went to St Macartan's Cathedral, where an interdenominational service was held.
The attendance included local politicians and religious figures.