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By Kieran McDaid
AS the children of Holy Cross Girl’s Primary made their way to school yesterday morning, they stumbled over the rubble of the previous night’s rioting.
The main Ardoyne Road was strewn with debris – bricks, bottles and burned-out cars – after fierce rioting between rival gangs of nationalists and loyalists.
The RUC said 21 officers were injured during more than four hours of violence when they placed themselves between the rival loyalist and republican factions, in addition to 14 hurt earlier in the day.
Over 100 petrol bombs were thrown during the rioting in the area, while gunmen fired five shots from the loyalist side in the Glenbryn estate.
The rioting came after loyalists attempted to prevent parents taking their children through the Glenbryn area to the Holy Cross school.
Monday night’s violence followed a sinister warning from the Red Hand Defenders that parents should stay away from the area.
Police were also threatened by the loyalist terrorists.
A mother of one of the Holy Cross pupils said her child would not go to school when she saw all the debris on the street.
“She was scared enough as it was, but when she saw broken bottles, burnt out cars and rocks and bricks on the street, she would not go any further. She made me turn around at the top of Alliance Avenue and leave her back home,” she said.
An elderly resident of the mainly nationalist Alliance Avenue said Monday night’s violence was “very intense”.
“We knew the trouble would start up again when the children tried to go back to school but last night’s rioting was incredibly frightening and will not help the situation,” he said.
“It is so senseless and destructive, there seems to be no end of it.”
Nationalists have accused loyalists of having started the violence, but PUP assembly member for north Belfast, Billy Hutchinson, claimed the trouble began when nationalists attacked a community centre, causing a full-scale riot.
SDLP councillor Martin Morgan said the continuing rioting in north Belfast, as a spin-off of the events at the Holy Cross school, “highlight the running sore of sectarianism which is still at the fore in that part of the city”.
He called on public representatives to work with each other to find a solution to the Holy Cross dispute, but said: “After a night like last night, and a morning such as we have just witnessed, it’s hard to have hope for north Belfast.”
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