Yesterday was the 13th anniversary of the death of Peter McBride.
Murder Victim Peter McBride
“In Belfast on 4th September 1992 the British Army stopped 18-year-old father of two Peter McBride. An identity check showed that he was not wanted and a body search found him unarmed. Peter McBride panicked and ran away from the soldiers. Scots Guardsmen Mark Wright and James Fisher chased him, shot him in the back and killed him.”
Read about Peter McBride at >>Troops Out Movement
A lorry was set on fire at Disraeli Street
Police officers have been attacked by loyalist petrol bombers during a series of searches in north Belfast.
Fire crews were also attacked with bricks and bottles at about 1200 BST. Three vehicles were hijacked and set on fire in the Woodvale area.
The violence follows the arrest of a man on Sunday in connection with the discovery of a gun and material linked to loyalist paramilitaries.
It is understood the UVF held a “show of strength” in the area on Saturday.
Chief Superintendent Mike Little, district commander for north Belfast said; ‘’ I have made it clear that criminal activity will not be tolerated in north Belfast and this operation is a further indication of how seriously we are tackling the issue.”
He said that police received reports that a number of armed and masked men were present in the Woodvale area on Saturday.
“We were very active in the area and gathered evidence of criminal activity,” he said.
“We have studied this activity and the ongoing policing operation is a direct result of what was recorded.'’
Monday’s trouble began as police moved in to search houses in the mainly loyalist area.
A soft drinks van was hijacked and set alight in Disraeli Street, two vans were set on fire in Parkview Terrace.
On Sunday, a juvenile was also arrested after violence involving between 30 and 50 youths at Enfield Street. He was charged with a public order offence.
By Debra Douglas
newsdesk@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
05 September 2005
THE DUP and Sinn Fein were locked in a war of words last night after a weekend riot in a normally quiet seaside village in Co Antrim.
A Sinn Fein councillor has called on the Police Ombudsman to investigate the PSNI’s handling of the late night trouble in Cushendall, which left one officer with a suspected broken nose.
But the DUP hit out at this demand, and said the incident in the early hours of Sunday morning underlined a need for more policing resources.
The PSNI said a crowd of up to 50 people surrounded officers as they tried to make an arrest in the Bridge Street area of the coastal village.
Three officers were injured and one was taken to hospital for treatment for a suspected broken nose and multiple cuts and bruises.
A PSNI spokesman confirmed that police used CS spray to disperse the crowd.
But Sinn Fein councillor Oliver McMullan claimed he was struck by police as he tried to stop trouble, alleging that he was hit with batons and sprayed with CS gas.
He added: “Many Cushendall residents, including myself, will be making complaints to the Police Ombudsman regarding this and I will be asking that a full investigation be carried out.”
But DUP MLA Mervyn Storey criticised the attitude of Sinn Fein to the incident. “Here we have Sinn Fein talking about the heavy handiness of police - they do not support the police and aren’t exactly impartial observers.
“The incident also tells us a lot about the attitude of some people in society towards the police - people who are not prepared to accept the rule of law that attack one officer so viciously, he ends up in hospital.”
Mr Storey said he would be speaking to the local police commander about the situation today.
He said: “This incident highlights the totally inadequate resources the police have to deal with call-outs here.”
A police spokesman said one man was arrested for assault and public order offences.
In Belfast meanwhile, a police officer was taken to hospital with a suspected broken wrist after trouble flared in Andersonstown in the early hours of yesterday morning.
Shortly before 2.30am, police were responding to a report that a number of men armed with baseball bats were in the vicinity of South Link when a crowd of up to 40 men and women attacked them.
One of the officers was beaten to the ground and repeatedly punched and kicked. He was taken to hospital where he underwent treatment for a suspected broken wrist and multiple cuts and bruises.
A police spokesman said one man was arrested and that inquiries were continuing.
Families who live in the Old Throne housing estate, which backs onto Hazelwood Integrated Primary School, have called for tighter security and want a buffer zone created between the school and their homes.
Residents of the estate, which is just off the Whitewell Road, say that youths from White City are breaking into the primary school and using its grounds as a base to launch attacks.
The latest attacks on the homes came in the early hours of Monday morning when two houses were attacked.
John Meredith was up late watching a film on TV and immediately after he switched off his living room lights the attack was launched, he said.
“It was a total shock. I had just switched the light off and I heard two very loud bangs. At first I thought it was a blast bomb or something like that. The attackers are obviously very determined. They lay in wait until the lights went out.
“It was a stinking night outside, it was blowing a gale and the rain was bouncing. Why anybody would even be out on a night like that, never mind lying in a field awaiting their chance to attack us is beyond me.”
Mr Meredith’s wife Kellie and two children Megan (9) and Darragh (3) were asleep at the time.
The paint bombs hit the patio window smashing the double glazing and causing substantial damage to the house.
John Meredith called for more protection.
“The attacks come from the school grounds and have been ongoing for months now. Something needs to be done about the security arrangements.
“There is a notice saying that there is 24-hour guarding, that is a joke. I have never seen any security guards patrolling in all the time I have lived here.’’
A simultaneous attack was carried out on his next-door neighbours with the paint hitting an upstairs bedroom window just feet away from Ann Marie Brown’s children’s bunk beds.
“I really fear for my family’s lives. If these had been petrol bombs or anything more lethal someone would have been killed,” said Mrs Brown.
Sinn Féin councillor Tierna Cunningham said the attacks were part of a continuing sectarian campaign and has slammed both the attacks in Old Throne and Graymount.
“The Whitewell has seen a long list of attacks against nationalists since before Christmas.
“Clearly a pattern has emerged here and it is one that has to be brought to an end.
“I have appealed before, and I am appealing yet again, for those with influence in the loyalist community to do whatever is in their power to bring attacks in the Whitewell to an end.
“These attacks are wrong whatever section of the community they come from and need to be brought to an end immediately.
“Sunday night saw three homes being attacked in Old Throne and Graymount. Those who are carrying out the attacks need to desist now before somebody is seriously injured or killed.
“Some residents have raised concerns about attacks like this being launched from Hazelwood’s grounds, but my understanding is that Hazelwood has 24-hour security and it should be examined in order to help stop these attacks.
“However this should not deflect from where these attacks are coming from, or who is behind them.
“Ultimately it is up to loyalist and unionist political representatives responsible to do what they can to help stop attacks being launched from the school grounds.
“Sinn Féin has been vociferous in its opposition to such attacks and have been working actively to bring them to an end.
“What we need to see now is unionist political leaders taking the same action not just in North Belfast but right across the North of Ireland.
“They sit with loyalist paramilitaries on forums and need to be using these platforms to put whatever pressure they have to influence loyalist paramilitaries and help end sectarian attacks.”
Journalist:: Staff Reporter
Sinn Féin MLA and Lisburn councillor Michael Ferguson has criticised the Lisburn Strategic Partnership for its failure to allocate European Peace Funding.
He said those areas worst affected by conflict, deprivation and poverty in nationalist areas of the council had lost out to groups in middle class areas such as Hillsborough.
But the DUP has hit back saying any group that did not match the criteria could not go through to the second part of the funding process whatever area they were from.
The council is to allocate almost £1million with almost 50 applicants in the running for the cash.
Some 61 per cent were successful but 63 per cent of those denied came from areas like Poleglass and Twinbrook with only five getting through to the next stage meaning that the area may get none of the money, said Cllr Ferguson.
Mr Ferguson has also said that the grounds upon which the decision not to award applications from the predominantly Catholic areas did not “add up”.
“The majority of the applications coming from the area of Poleglass and Twinbrook were refused on the grounds that they did not address the issue of reconciliation. But we are told that applications coming from areas like Hillsborough, Maghaberry, Knockmore, Halftown and Old Warren do. It’s also my understanding that one unionist politician contended that the awards should only go to Protestant areas and new projects which would also ensure the exclusion of any community organisation from a nationalist area that was able to successfully complete an application form.
“I will be recommending that every group from the Colin Neighbourhood area that has been refused put in an immediate appeal and I will be asking Sinn Féin representatives on Monitoring Bodies and our MEP to challenge the exclusion of Catholic and nationalist community groups on such spurious grounds.”
But DUP councillor Edwin Poots, who sat on the assessment panel, dismissed the claims of nationalist exclusion saying all parties in the council had agreed to the criteria.
“We had to accept what was put on paper and some really worthwhile groups failed to meet the criteria. Quite a number of groups in the Twinbrook and Poleglass and other parts of Lisburn City Council didn’t get funding. A lot of these people are very experienced in filling in the forms so I was somewhat surprised that issues they needed to identify weren’t identified in the applications.”
He said no decision had yet been made on the five groups that would qualify for the funding.
“This is not a sectarian issue, it was about points for groups dealing with reconciliation,” said Cllr Poots.
andrea@irelandclick.com
Journalist:: Staff Reporter
Republicans throughout the North have been called on to come out in strength to support the upcoming commemoration of Sinn Féin’s one-hundredth birthday in Dublin.
A rally is being organised for September 24th and it is expected people from throughout the island will be converging on Dublin for the carnival event.
The hope is that every town and city in Ireland will be involved and the carnival atmosphere will be in effect with everyone being encouraged to make their own banners and dress up as heroic figures from Ireland’s past such as James Connolly and Countess Markievicz.
mittee who are aiming to make this a day to remember with the celebrations both commemorating and celebrating the history of the republican struggle throughout the last century.
One of the local organisers is Caóimhín Mhic Giolla Mhín who said that the celebrations will help boost the party and their aims in this centenary year.
“This promises to be one of the biggest events in the history of Sínn Feín and we hope all republicans will show their support by turning out.
“It is going to be a fantastic day out with hopefully up to 50,000 people converging on Dublin to enjoy the street theatre and pageants that will be organised, while sending the message that it is time to make partition history.”
As the centre point of the one hundred year celebration the rally will mark the strides made by Sinn Féin in the last year, something that has seen the party increase its strength, as Caóimhín explains.
“This year because of the celebrations the Sinn Féin website has been inundated with people who want to join the party and help work towards a united Ireland. We have also been engaging with a wide spectrum of people including unionists in debates and various events to mark the centenary.
“There have been road shows going into universities all around Ireland encouraging young people to get involved in the party so it is a very, very proactive campaign and we expect tens of thousands of both old and new members to come out and support the day.”
In order to get as many people out to Dublin the Céad Bliain Committee has organised a high profile publicity drive.
“The fact that we are making it locally visual will attract people. There has been a poster campaign which many people will have seen in pubs and the shops and clubs. There are also leaflets going round and we are organising white line publicity drives to tell people what it happening.
“There will be free buses running to Dublin for the day out so I would urge as many people as possible to come and enjoy the day.”
The free buses will be running from all parts of Belfast and more information can be obtained by contacting 02890 223000.
Journalist:: Staff Reporter
BY Damian McCarney
Two families in Dunmurry were lucky to escape injury as joyriders drove a hijacked taxi through a garden wall, tossing a lamppost onto a car. At about 1.15am on Friday morning a group of three young males got into a Rent-a-Cab taxi at their Botanic Avenue depot and asked to be taken to Dunmurry. On approaching Poleglass they threatened the driver with a knife. The driver struggled with the attackers but received a wound to his arm, and was finally removed from the car.
The attackers then drove to Credenhill Park in Dunmurry and reversed into the garden walls of two houses at speed, tossing a lamppost onto a Toyota Corolla car parked in the driveway.
The owner of one of the houses in the quiet cul-de-sac, Mrs Jane McGowan was shaken by the incident but was grateful that no one was injured.
“I think that the people responsible for this are lowlifes. My neighbour said that the one he saw looked about 15 years old. What are his parents doing? If your 15 year old is not in bed, you should go out and find out where they are.
“It scares me to think of what they could have done. That was an old concrete lamppost and if it hadn’t hit my car it could have come into one of the bedrooms.”
The hijacking was the third such incident to happen to a Rent-a-Cab driver working in the Colin area in the last year. Before Christmas one driver was brought into Colin Glen forest park and made to remove his clothes at knifepoint.
A spokesperson for Rent-a-Cab taxis, based on Botanic Avenue, said he was fearful that such attacks could have fatal consequences.
“There is a knife culture which is posing a danger to our drivers. This is totally unacceptable and if it continues someone will be killed or seriously injured.
“The driver is very shaken and he has lost everything. Like many taxi drivers, he only has third party insurance so the damage to his car will not be covered. He has lost his job and livelihood until he can afford a new car.”
Visiting the Credenhill Park families, Sinn Féin West Belfast MLA, Michael Ferguson was shocked at the level of destruction caused to the properties.
“We can only be relieved that the lamp did not crash through a bedroom window on top of those sleeping in their beds. The two families affected will now have to incur premium loss to their insurance to cover the damage which is dreadful for these hardworking families.”
The DOE sent a crew out soon after the incident to ensure that the lamppost was not posing a danger to the local community.
“I want to commend the D.O.E. Street Lighting Service who responded so swiftly to support the families and make safe the area and also the Neighbourhood Watch who came out onto the streets in the aftermath. It is community based organisations like these that we also need to support,” said Mr Ferguson.
Journalist:: Damien McCarney
Colin Safer Neighbourhood Project hits out at PSNI over runarounds
An anti-car crime community group has accused the PSNI of interfering in its attempts to get vehicle recovery services to take away cars.
The claims came after the response to a so-called runaround car that sat so long in a West Belfast car park that it was taken again and is now illegally driven on the roads.
But the PSNI rubbished the claims yesterday saying local people should call out the police rather than the pick-up companies to qualify for Operation Cleanup and a more speedy response.
A PSNI spokesman said police, rather than recovery firms employed to take runarounds and stolen cars off the streets, would guarantee quicker removal.
Stephen Magennis, chairman for the Colin Safer Neighbourhood Project, said his group was alerted to a car that had been parked beside Laurel Glen taxi depot on Friday.
“We checked the car and found it had a broken window and tax two months out of date and damage inside the car,” he said.
“It clearly needed lifted off the streets as the young people gathering were planning to burn the car.”
Mr Magennis said he contacted Marsdens recovery to report the car, but he was told the PSNI had not replied to the company’s request to take the vehicle off the road.
Though members of the group stayed with the car until 4am on Saturday, eventually community workers had to return home. The car was taken around 4pm on Saturday without any response from the PSNI.
“It was taken by whoever parked it up as Marsdens still had no confirmation to recover the car,” said Mr Magennis.
“Once again another runaround gets back onto our streets due to poor policing. This is not an isolated incident and has happened a number of times on our project to volunteers whilst out providing an essential service to our community where volunteers are stranded with a car for over four hours tying down members of our project. Our contact is Marsdens, but the PSNI will send in another recovery agency to undermine and counteract our work.”
Local MLA Michael Ferguson said the Colin Safer Neighbourhood had been involved in the recovery of over 300 stolen or runabout cars in the last two years.
“In recent meetings with the Fire and Rescue Service it was revealed that it costs £10,000 to remove one vehicle from our streets. This is money that could go into the health service or education,” he said.
“The PSNI should be recognising that this group has helped save the public purse around three million pounds, instead of trying to undermine them.”
A PSNI spokesman said only through local people calling the police could a vehicle be brought under Operation Cleanup.
“(Contacting) Marsdens would not be classed as Operation Cleanup. If people don’t ring the police first it vastly slows the process down,” he said.
Journalist:: Andrea McKernon
Published: 5 September, 2005
Sinn Féin North Belfast MLA Gerry Kelly has challenged the DUP to come clean over their role in the importation of arms through Ulster Resistance from South Africa and British Army double agent Brian Nelson that lead to the murder of 280 people and accused them of engaging in a cheap propaganda stunt in travelling to Columbia.
Mr Kelly said:
“This latest stunt is in stark contrast to the failure of unionist leaders to tackle the 100 plus attacks carried out by loyalists against the nationalist community over the last two and a half months. Rather than using the return of the Colombia 3 to distract people the DUP should deal with the very real crisis in the political process created by the failure of unionists to deal with unionist paramilitary violence.
“Jeffery Donaldson is travelling over 5000 miles yet he won’t deal with loyalist violence on his doorstep.
“Instead of engaging in cheap propaganda stunts the DUP would more usefully come clean about their role in the importation of South African arms through Ulster Resistance and Brian Nelson that lead to the murder of over 280 nationalists.” ENDS
A classroom has been destroyed in what the Fire and Rescue Service said was an arson attack at a school in County Derry.
The fire at Roe Valley Integrated Primary School, Limavady, was reported at about 1840 BST on Sunday.
The temporary classroom was well alight when fire crews arrived at the scene.
District commander Willie Lynch said that, following a preliminary investigation, he believed that the fire was started deliberately.
“The classroom was well alight when the fire crews arrived.
“Adjacent to that was an oil tank which was causing some concern,” he said.
“Coming from a preliminary investigation which I have carried out, I believe that the fire was started deliberately.”
'So venceremos, beidh bua againn eigin lá eigin. Sealadaigh abú.'
--Bobby Sands
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