GOVERNMENT and Opposition politicians condemned the IRA bomb scares at Aintree, with the Taoiseach accusing the Republican movement of delivering a calculated snub to the peace process.
Mr Bruton said that the IRA action had come "within hours of a call for peace from Senator Edward Kennedy on behalf of millions of Irish Americans".
The Tanaiste, Mr Spring, speaking at the Clare County Party Selection Convention in Ennis, said: "The people who are directing a campaign of bomb scares such as this are not helping in getting Sinn Fein to the conference table". This sort of violence made it very difficult for the Government as well as all the parties in the Republic to understand the mixed signals they were getting. Sinn Fein said they wanted to be part of the peace talks but yet the IRA continued with the campaign of violence.
He said it was felt over the years that there was a significant bloc within Sinn Fein leadership "who wanted to get into democratic politics but obviously they were not carrying the sway at the present time, given the activities of the IRA."
The Minister for Tourism and Trade, Mr Kenny, said that if the action was a prelude to an IRA ceasefire, it may have been an attempt to divide constitutional political parties. This would be done by "having a long enough ceasefire to make a case for admission to talks but a short enough one to ensure that no unionist would actually turn up".
"This may give amusement to the cynics in the republican leadership who took pleasure in destroying the Grand National but is no contribution to a viable peace process, he said.
The Progressive Democrat leader, Ms Mary Harney, described the bomb threat as "despicable" while her party's Northern Ireland spokesman said that it had damaged Ireland's name worldwide.
The Minister for Social Welfare, Mr De Rossa, said the threat demonstrated the IRA's contempt for ordinary people. "The republican movement will have to understand that these tactics will not succeed and that continued bomb attacks or bomb scares will result only in their further isolation from democratic politics."