FRESH investigations into the 1998 Omagh bombing, in which 29 people were killed, were ordered today with a Belfast judge saying that it could have been prevented.

Mr Justice Mark Horner ruled out a public inquiry, but said that a probe should look specifically at whether a more co-ordinated approach “north and south of the border had a real prospect of preventing” the attack.

The Omagh bombing was claimed by the Real IRA, a splinter group from the Provisional IRA which opposed the Good Friday Agreement.

It issued a warning some 40 minutes before the blast, but police inadvertently moved people towards the bomb.

Rumours have long persisted that British, Irish and US intelligence had information that could have prevented the bombing, but failed to share it with the police.

The case was brought to the Belfast High Court by Michael Gallagher, whose son Aiden was one of the victims.

He said that the verdict was a vindication of the view that there are “significant issues” that need to be addressed.

“For a very long time there’s been no doubt in my mind that Omagh was a preventable atrocity, but nobody wanted to hear that message, not the Irish government, not the British government, but now we have an independent person who has said it,” he said.