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By Sharon O’Neill
THE Red Hand Defenders yesterday admitted responsibility for firing shots during serious rioting in north Belfast, which lasted for several hours.
Forty-one RUC officers and two soldiers were injured during the disturbances on Tuesday evening at a number of flashpoints in the Ardoyne area.
A total of 15 blast bombs and 250 petrol bombs were thrown as rioting engulfed the area until the early hours of yesterday morning.
The loyalist gunmen took to the streets hours after Catholic children faced up to 200 protesters as they tried to walk to the front entrance of the Holy Cross Girls Primary School.
The security forces came under sustained attack for several hours during the trouble which was mainly confined to the loyalist Glenbryn estate.
The 300-strong crowed hurled blast and petrol bombs and several shots were fired at police lines.
At one stage loyalists set a car alight in an attempt to break through the security barrier to reach the nationalist area.
A short time before Catholic
children made their way to school yesterday morning British army bomb disposal experts were tasked to examine two suspicious objects.
The suspect device found at Alliance Avenue was declared a hoax and a firework-type device was discovered at Ardoyne Road.
Yesterday the Red Hand Defenders – widely believed to be a cover name for the UDA and LVF – admitted responsibility for firing the shots the previous evening.
Using a recognised codeword a caller to a Belfast newsroom said the group opened fire and also admitted responsibility for a bomb attack at the Holy Cross School yesterday morning which left two RUC officers with leg injuries.
Speaking after the latest night of rioting, SDLP councillor Martin Morgan accused loyalist paramilitaries of waging an orchestrated campaign in a bid to heighten tensions over the dispute.
“I think all the violence that’s come from the loyalist district is clearly orchestrated. It is organised,” he said.
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