Man arrested in Belfast in connection with Birmingham bombing investigations in 1974

A MAN HAS been arrested in connection with investigations into the murder of 21 people in the 1974 bombings at a pub in Birmingham.

Officers from the West Midlands Police Counterterrorism Unit, working with colleagues from the PSNI, arrested the 65-year-old at his home in Belfast today. He was arrested under the Terrorism Act.

A search of your home is in progress.

You will be interviewed on warning at a Northern Ireland police station.

On November 21, 1974, 21 people lost their lives in the bombing of two pubs in the English city of Birmingham.

Six Irish men, thereafter dubbed the Birmingham Six, spent 16 years in prison for the crime before being acquitted of all crimes related to it.

The men later claimed that the police had forced them to sign confessions through physical and psychological torture.

While the IRA never claimed responsibility for the attack, it is believed to have carried out the attack.