The New IRA has been urged to “pack up” after it urged members to continue targeting the security forces.

In a New Year statement circulated online, the hardline group “commended” its members and urged them to “do your up-most to target the crown forces when an opportunity presents itself”.

The statement, signed T O’Neill, said that in 2026 the group intended “continued resistance to the occupation of our country”.

“We are, and continue to be the few but faithful, with a deathless dream that cannot be bought or beaten into surrender,” it added.

The statement also offered support to republican prisoners and was critical of those who do not back them along with “constitutional false prophet republicans” and “right-wing reactionaries who twist the history books in an effort to give their bigoted ideology some form of patriotic credit”.

The group also referenced “a sharp rise in imperialistic capitalist war efforts across the globe”.

“We salute all organisations and forms of resistance used against imperialist forces,” it added.

Alliance Party Policing Board member Peter McReynolds said: “The New IRA, along with every other paramilitary group, needs to pack up and leave the stage immediately.”

He said such groups offer “nothing but hatred, bigotry, and violence, while trying to drag us back to the bad days.

“Their poison is not wanted by the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland and they should leave the community to get on in peace,” he added.

“Northern Ireland does not want or need anything they are offering in 2026, nor have we ever.”