Police in Northern Ireland find gun while investigating dissident activity

Detectives have seized a gun in an operation directed against dissident republicans in north Belfast. Army bomb disposal officers are now at the scene of the security operation in the Clifton Street area. The main road at Carlisle Circus close to the Lower Shankill estate has been closed. The firearm was discovered after serious crime officers, investigating dissident republican activity, stopped a car on Wednesday evening. Two men, aged 29 and 41, have been arrested and are being held for questioning at Antrim Serious Crime Suite. The security operation comes less than two weeks after an aborted bomb attack – claimed by the republican terror group Oghlaigh na hEireann – in the north of the city. A large bomb had been placed in a hijacked Volkswagen people carrier which had been left abandoned at shops facing Antrim Road Police Service of Northern Ireland station. A second device was also tied to a child's bicycle, the PSNI said earlier this week.