Suspected IRA arms cache found on Isle of Wight

LONDON – Anti-terror police say they are examining a suspected Irish Republican Army weapons cache discovered on the Isle of Wight off England's south coast.

Police announced Thursday that a man walking his dog found the long-abandoned weapons Aug. 24 in Parkhurst Forest.

The stash includes two guns, ammunition and two book-sized incendiary bombs similar to devices that the IRA used in the 1990s to destroy businesses at nighttime.

Officers from England's South East Counter Terrorism Unit and the Northern Ireland police are jointly examining the weapons.

The major IRA faction, the Provisionals, planted hundreds of bombs in England from 1973 to 1996 before calling an open-ended truce. The Provisionals officially disarmed in 2005.

Convicted IRA members sometimes were housed in the Isle of Wight's three prisons in the 1970s and 1980s.