Scrabble?! PREVISIONAL

Definitions of PREVISIONAL in various dictionaries:

The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA or Provisional IRA or Provos) was an Irish republican revolutionary terrorist organisation that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland, facilitate the reunification of Ireland and bring about an independent socialist republic encompassing all of Ireland. It was the biggest and most active republican paramilitary group during the Troubles. It saw itself as the successor to the original IRA and called itself simply the Irish Republican Army (IRA), or Óglaigh na hÉireann in Irish, and was broadly referred to as such by others. The IRA was designated an unlawful terrorist organisation in the United Kingdom and an unlawful organisation in the Republic of Ireland.The Provisional IRA emerged in December 1969, following a split in the republican movement. It was so-called to mirror the 1916 Provisional Government of the Irish Republic, and also to designate it as temporary pending reorganisation of the movement. Although this eventually happened in 1970, the name "Provisional" stuck with them. The Troubles had begun shortly before when a largely Catholic, nonviolent civil rights campaign was met with violence from both Ulster loyalists and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), culminating in the August 1969 riots and deployment of British troops. The IRA initially focused on defence of Catholic areas, but it began an offensive campaign in 1971 (see timeline). The IRA's primary goal was to force the United Kingdom to negotiate a withdrawal from Northern Ireland. It used guerrilla tactics against the British Army and RUC in both rural and urban areas. It also carried out a bombing campaign in Northern Ireland and England against what it saw as political and economic targets. The IRA called a final ceasefire in July 1997, after its political wing Sinn Féin was re-admitted into the Northern Ireland peace talks. It supported the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and in 2005 it disarmed under international supervision. An internal British Army document (released in 2007 under the Freedom of Information Act) examining its 37 years of deployment in Northern Ireland, describes the IRA as "a professional, dedicated, highly skilled and resilient force", while loyalist paramilitaries and other republican groups are described as "little more than a collection of gangsters". American media usually described the IRA as "activists" and "guerillas", while the British press widely dubbed them "terrorists". Several splinter groups have been formed as a result of splits within the IRA, including the Continuity IRA which emerged from a split in 1986 but did not become active until the Provisional IRA ceasefire of 1994, and the Real IRA after the final 1997 ceasefire, both of which are still active in the low-level dissident Irish republican campaign.