Northern Ireland policeman, family escape grenade attack

Suspected nationalists in Northern Ireland threw a grenade at a police officer's house in County Fermanagh, west of Belfast, on Thursday.                                          

He and his family escaped injury as the grenade failed to explode but they have been forced to look for a safe-house for fear of being targeted again.  

A 1998 peace agreement largely ended three decades of violence between predominantly Catholic nationalist groups who want a united Ireland and mainly Protestant unionists who want Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom.                              

But nationalist splinter groups have stepped up attacks recently. The attacks are often aimed at police.                                           

Three police officers were injured last month when a military grenade was thrown at them in west Belfast. A police spokesperson could not immediately say whether the Fermanagh device was a similar grenade or homemade.