The following list of sectarian/race incidents and related issues is from 01 through 31 December 2001. We rely on a number of sources for our information, but this is by no means comprehensive. If you find incidents that have been left off the list please contact us.
Because of the extent of the ongoing loyalist feud, the PFC is keeping a log of incidents relating to it and is compiling a digest for readers (see previous updates on Loyalist Feud Incidents).
1 December, Friday
A 39-year-old Catholic man was set upon and severely injured by a loyalist gang in the centre of Ballynahinch, Co Down. The attack came shortly after a white Transit van was seen in the area. It is believed this could have been the same van associated with a group of loyalists who had attacked a number of nationalists in the town centre with baseball bats and iron bars two weeks previously. Working class nationalists from the Windmill Hill area fear more attacks as a proposed 8ft fence between Library Hill and nearby Loughside will force them to take a detour through the centre of town. Local sources have documented 32 separate sectarian attacks in the area since July. The RUC has been accused of standing idly by as loyalists carried out the attacks. Francie Branniff, the local Sinn Féin councillor said: "It's only a matter of time before the nationalist nightmare in Ballynahinch has its own Robert Hamill". (RM, CW)
In Larne Co Antrim, a young Catholic family was forced to flee after being threatened by an armed man. Tthe RUC informed them and a number of other Catholic families that the LVF had threatened to "shoot man, woman or child" if they did not leave the Seacourt estate. Local SDLP representative Danny O'Connor had previously presented Irish Foreign Minister Brian Cowen with a dossier detailing 150 sectarian attacks against Catholics in Larne in recent months. Local sources say it's only a matter of time before someone is killed. (IN, RUC)
In Fairway, also in Larne, a Catholic family vowed to stay, despite their home being petrol bombed in the 15th sectarian attack on the same family in two years. (IN)
On the same night in the Seacourt estate, the home of a Protestant family had its windows smashed and was set alight. (IN)
2 December, Saturday
In Coleraine, Co Derry, three men in boiler suits hijacked a car. Some time later one of them entered the Catholic owned Porterhouse Bar on the Waterside and fired a shot. This was the second attack on Catholic premises in eight days. (IN, DJ, RUC, CW)
Hopes that the annual Apprentice Boys' 'Closing of the Gates' ceremony in Derry would pass off peacefully were dashed when loyalist bandsmen charged a group of taunting nationalist teenagers and then clashed with the RUC. The trouble, though relatively minor in comparison with other years, occurred despite an agreement between the Apprentice Boys, Bogside residents and city centre businesses. (IN, DJ)
Two elderly Catholic sisters escaped injury after a petrol bomb, which failed to ignite properly, was thrown through the window of their house on the Old Glenarm Road in Larne. (IN)
3 December, Sunday
In Coleraine a Catholic couple and their 12-year-old daughter escaped injury after a pipe bomb was thrown at their Harper's Hill home. John Dallat, local SDLP assembly member, called on unionists in the town to do more to end the violence. Local sources say they are afraid it is only a matter of time before someone is killed. (RUC, IN, DJ)
A Catholic man and his two sons escaped injury after a pipe bomb was thrown at their house on the Old Glenarm Road in Larne, Co Antrim. (RUC, IN)
A short time later, in the Seacourt estate, a Catholic home was badly damaged in an arson attack. Media and community sources describe the problem in Larne as an "almost nightly litany of loyalist bombings"(IN, G)
In Harryville, near Ballymena, the parochial house of the Catholic Church of Our Lady was damaged in a sectarian arson attack. (IN)
5 December, Tuesday
Taxi driver Trevor Kell, 35, a Protestant, was shot dead after being called to pick up a fare on the loyalist Hesketh Road, off the Crumlin Road in Belfast. Loyalist sources claimed the dissident Real IRA was to blame. The Real IRA denied the claim. The RUC blamed republicans for the murder. (RM, IN, RUC. PFC)
A house was petrol bombed in the predominantly Protestant town of Newtownards, Co Down. The attack is suspected to have been sectarian. (IN, RM)
In Kells, Co Antrim, a pipe bomb exploded outside the front door of a Catholic home. (RM)
6 December, Wednesday
At 12.45pm Loyalist politicians denied that the killing of Trevor Kell had anything to do with the loyalist feud. Sinn Féin MLA Gerry Kelly said he didn't believe republicans were involved in the killing and urged nationalists to be vigilant against 'retaliatory' strikes. (IN)
At 3.30pm the hitherto feuding loyalist factions the UFF/UDA and the RHC/UVF issued a joint statement denying Trevor Kell's murder was linked to their feud. (IN)
At 4pm Gary Moore, a 37-year-old Catholic workman from Limavady, Co Derry was shot dead by loyalists while working in Monkstown, outside Belfast. Monkstown is a UVF stronghold, but loyalist sources said the UDA are thought to have carried out the murder. (RM, IN, RUC, BBC)
At 4.15pm on the Oldpark Road in North Belfast, 24-year-old Paul Scullion, a Catholic from the Ardoyne area, was shot and critically injured by a gunman who escaped on the back of a motor scooter. The gunman fired up to six shots, hitting Scullion in the stomach and groin. The attack took place just yards from Murray's Bookmakers where the UDA murdered three Catholics in 1992. Loyalist sources claimed that the UDA was again responsible. (IN, RM, BBC, RUC)
In Ballinamore, near Ballymoney, Co Antrim a pipe bomb was left on the windowsill of a house. The attack is thought to have been sectarian. (IN, RM)
At the high court in Belfast a man who was charged in connection with the wave of sectarian attacks on Catholics in the Seacourt estate in Larne was freed on bail. (IN)
In Maghaberry jail Pastor Clifford Peeples, the fundamentalist preacher serving time for possession of explosives, was assaulted after he allegedly taunted a Catholic inmate with sectarian abuse. (IN)
7 December, Thursday
RUC Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan, issued a statement blaming republicans for the murder of Trevor Kell and loyalists for the murder of Gary Moore and the attempted murder of Paul Scullion. He said it was too early to say exactly which groups were involved.
David Irvine of the PUP, welcomed the Chief Constable's comments, adding that he 'bowed' to his theory, having previously said that either loyalists or republicans could have been to blame. Gary McMichael, of the UDP, accused republicans of trying to drag loyalists into a spiral of violence. Sinn Féin's Gerry Kelly said that the Chief Constable's comments were unfortunate as it could lead to more nationalists being targeted. He also said that the "sinister hand" of the state could have been at work. Other republican sources echoed claims of British Army or RUC dirty tricks. Sinn Féin's Gerry Adams said he believed loyalists carried out all three murders. There was some media speculation about the possibility that it could have been the work of a renegade republican. A west Belfast loyalist source told the PFC that he found it hard to believe that it could have been the work of republicans, adding that he didn't know who had carried out the attack. A 22-year-old man subsequently taken to Gough Barracks for questioning by the RUC in connection with the murder on December 10 was released two days later without charge. The same man was later abducted and shot in the ankles, wrists and elbows. The RUC told the media that it could be individual republicans not connected to mainstream or dissident groups who had killed Kell. (IN, AN, RUC, BBC, CW, PFC,)
In Dunmurry, on the outskirts of Belfast, a Catholic-owned car dealership was petrol bombed for the third time. The number of attacks on Catholic homes, schools and businesses in the last three years in the village has now reached over 70. Local politicians have pleaded for the attacks to stop before someone is killed. (AN, IN)
8 December, Friday
In Coleraine two Catholic homes were attacked with pipe bombs. In both cases the devices exploded outside the house. In one, a 76-year-old blind pensioner was listening to a talking book when the device exploded, in the other a 30-year old man escaped injury when the device bounced off the kitchen window before exploding in his garden. (IN)
9 December, Saturday
In Derry Graham Miller, a Protestant taxi driver, was shot and injured by loyalists "loosely associated with the UDA", who believed he was a Catholic. The would-be assassins had called a Catholic taxi firm asking for a driver to be sent to an address in the predominantly loyalist Lincoln Courts. The taxi firm however passed on the fare to another firm with which it has an arrangement to exchange call-outs. The DUP's Willy Hay, in condemning the attack, said: "Here we have somebody ringing for a taxi to a particular company and that company transferring it to another company. This is why we have a Protestant injured and lying in hospital this morning." A statement was later issued purporting to come from a group calling itself "Óglaigh na h-Éireann" (a name currently associated with both the IRA and the Real IRA), which threatened ‘retaliation’ if loyalists continued to mount attacks on Catholics. No recognised codeword accompanied the statement. (IN, BBC, DJ)
In Newry, a Protestant family who have been living in the predominantly Catholic Doran's Hill for 50 years have put their house on the market after a series of sectarian attacks. Jim Martin a 46-year-old member of the Orange Order and the Royal Black Perceptory who was born in the house, says that the house was petrol bombed in 1996. In the latest incident a concrete block was thrown through the living room window while he and his elderly father slept upstairs. The incident occurred on the same week-end as a seminar was held in the town entitled "No Room at the Inn – Is Newry a cold house for Protestants?". In an editorial, the Irish News wrote "People who are in a minority in an area should enjoy the support of their neighbours and it must be made clear that intimidation will not be tolerated." (IN)
12 December, Tuesday
Loyalists left a pipe bomb in a nationalist area near Castlewellan, Co Down. Local sources claim it took the RUC several days to get around to defusing the device. (RM)
15 December, Friday
As the feuding loyalist groupings UDA/UFF and UVF/RHC (Red Hand Commando) called a truce to end the five month feud which had claimed seven lives, Shankill Road Pastor Jack McKee sought to assuage nationalists' fears that the loyalist rift would be healed by renewed attacks on Catholics. "We want the Catholic community to know they will not be turned on," he said. Welcoming these comments, Sinn Féin's Gerry Kelly said, "I would feel better if [the comments] came from the paramilitary groups themselves". (IN)
Danny O'Connor, the SDLP assemblyman representing nationalists in Larne, Co Antrim, where attacks are an almost daily occurrence, told the Guardian about the "continuous flow" of attacks on Catholics in the town, mostly carried out by young recruits into the UDA. Mr O'Connor, who is reluctant to release data about attacks on Catholics for fear of reprisals, urged people in the unionist community to do more to put an end to the violence. "These people are fascists. Ordinary, decent Protestants should be aware that they'll not be content with driving Catholics out, they'll want rid of everyone who doesn't agree with their views." (G)
16 December Saturday.
The Andersonstown News reported that Belfast City Council's plans to convert Beechmount's hard cinder pitches to grass would be welcomed by a number of soccer teams in nationalist west Belfast whose pitches have been regularly vandalised and daubed with loyalist paramilitary graffiti in sectarian attacks. (AN)
St Macnissi’s Catholic Church hall near Kells, Co Antrim was extensively damaged in a sectarian arson attack in the early hours of the morning. This was the third attack on the building in four years.(IN)
21 December, Thursday
At Belfast Crown court twins Mervyn and Paul Armstrong (22) were among four members of the paramilitary Orange Volunteers to be convicted of a variety of offences. Mervyn Armstrong had been arrested with an AK47 assault rifle. The court heard that, along with Stuart Wilson (24) and Alan Lyn (21), they had joined Stoneyford Orange lodge. The RUC found bomb-making instructions at the Orange Hall. Wilson was found to have the names and addresses of hundreds of alleged republicans stored at the Hall. The court was told that the gangs’ intended target was "two Provos - a husband and wife". (IN)
22 December, Friday
Loyalists were blamed for the pipe bomb that exploded at the home of a Catholic family in Carrickfergus, Co Antrim. The family were uninjured. (RM)
Portadown Loyalists held a carol service on Drumcree Hill to celebrate the 900th day of their siege of the nationalist community on the Garvaghy Road.
The December-January edition of WARRIOR, the UDA's "voice of true Loyalism in the North of Ulster" carried a two page Christmas message from the North Antrim/Londonderry Brigade Ulster Defence Association. The following is an extract:
…A special greetings (sic) to all our friends here in Ulster who
have helped further the cause of Ulster, whose help and aid
we deem invaluable, yet their efforts must remain openly
unparsed (sic).
Our Best wishes for our comrades in Norway, South Africa
and Serbia.
Yuletide greetings to our American friends and thank-you
for all your help and aid this past year- wishing you have a
brighter whiter Christmas and future!…[our emphasis]
24/25 December, Christmas Eve
The RUC reported that a student at the University of Ulster was abducted from a pub in the nationalist William St area of Derry and was taken to a nearby flat where he was assaulted. According to reports in the local media a number of armed and masked men claiming to be from the IRA entered the premises and kidnapped the man, a Catholic from Newtownards, because they believed him to be a Protestant. Attempts by the PFC to verify the circumstances of the incident have proved difficult. Local media reported the incident as having occurred on Christmas night with the man eventually being set free in the Central Drive area of Creggan in the early hours of December 26. According to these reports he had been stripped, assaulted and burnt with cigarettes. In fact the pub in question was closed on Christmas night. Bar staff and patrons are adamant that no abduction took place nor did any group of armed and masked men enter the pub during the Christmas period. Sources at the University have been unable to confirm the allegations. A number of people have suggested to us that a man who had been in the bar on Christmas Eve was abducted outside the bar and taken away. Given that he later sought treatment at a local hospital it seems clear that he was assaulted. By whom and for what reason remains a mystery.
29 December, Friday
Springfield Road residents in Belfast petitioned the Northern Ireland Office to extend the security wall at the interface with the loyalist Shankill Road. There have been continuous attacks on nationalists from across the peace line since July. (RM)
Sources:
AN: Andersonstown News.
BBC: BBC radio and television news, BBC online, Radio Foyle.
CW: Local community workers.
IN: Irish News.
IOS: Ireland on Sunday.
Obs Observer
PFC: Pat Finucane Centre.
RUC: RUC website.