Sectarian incidents and attacks

Introduction:

The following list of sectarian and other hate-driven incidents and attacks is from 1 through 30 January 2002. The criteria we use for inclusion is based on the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) criteria; if a person/organisation feels that the motivation for an attack against them was sectarian (or racist or homophobic), then it should be counted as such. 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. A full dossier of sectarian and other hate attacks from January 1999 until Dcember 2001 is also available.

January 1, Tuesday.
Loyalists attempted, for the 20th time in six months, to smash their way into the home of Catholic grandmother in the Whitewell area of north Belfast. The two other houses on the section of the road that are occupied by Catholics were also attacked. The woman has been too afraid to go to work since the trouble began in July 2001. (IN, CW)

January 2, Wednesday.
Loyalists attacked a Catholic man in Newington Street, north Belfast, stabbing him repeatedly in the head. The victim, Joe Murphy, a 45-year-old father of five, had come out to challenge a gang of loyalists who were attacking property. Neighbours tended to the man until an ambulance arrived. (IN)

January 3, Thursday.
William Campbell, a 19-year-old member of the UDA, died as a result of injuries sustained when the bomb he was handling exploded prematurely. The incident occurred at Winston Way in Coleraine. (RUC/PSNI, IN, BT, BBC)

The DUP’s Gregory Campbell claimed that those who carried out bomb attacks on Catholics had turned to violence when they saw republicans benefiting from the IRA’s campaign. In a separate statement Mr Campbell said that Protestants were now second-class citizens in the north. (IN)

The UDA called on all sides in north Belfast to refrain from carrying out sectarian attacks. (IN, NBN)

Loyalists threw what the RUC/PSNI described as a "substantial" blast bomb into the living room of a Catholic mother and her four children in Manor Street in north Belfast. The RUC/PSNI said that the family had only escaped death and injury because they were upstairs at the time. (IN, RUC/PSNI, NBN)

Catholics were urged to stay vigilant after the RUC/PSNI uncovered a cache of 500 bottles, believed to have been stockpiled for making petrol bombs, in Tigers Bay, north Belfast. (IN)

January 4, Friday.
A survey carried out by the University of Ulster’s Peter Shirlow found that Protestants and Catholics living in interface areas are even less integrated now than they were ten years ago, with the gap being even wider among the younger generation. (IN)

January 5, Saturday.
It was reported that prison authorities were considering disciplinary action against jailed UFF/UDA leader Johnny Adair and a number of his associates after a serious assault on a Catholic inmate. (IN)

The South Belfast News reported an increasing number of serious sectarian attacks in the University Avenue area in recent weeks, including one in which a Catholic man lost the sight in one eye. (SBN)

January 6, Sunday.
A woman and her four-year-old child were injured when a blast bomb was thrown through their living room window in Westway, north Belfast. (RUC/PSNI)

January 9, Wednesday.
Serious rioting broke out in north Belfast with 136 petrol bombs thrown, along with fireworks, bricks and acid bombs. 48 police officers were injured, along with four nationalist civilians who received gunshot wounds in an incident in Hesketh Park. (RUC/PSNI, IN)

January 10, Thursday.
Loyalists from White City in north Belfast threw petrol bombs, fireworks and bricks at Catholic homes in Serpentine Avenue. (IN)

Armed loyalists attacked Our Lady of Mercy girl’s school in Ardoyne, damaging a number of cars belonging to staff at the school. (IN, BBC, RUC/PSNI)

January 11 Friday. An Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern commented on the fact that, in spite of being responsible for more than two thirds of violent incidents in the north, very few loyalist paramilitaries were appearing in court for those offences. The comments echo northern nationalist concerns that the loyalist campaign is being allowed to continue without arrests. (IN, Obs, BBC)

A caller from the Red Hand Defenders (RHD) to the Irish News warned "all teachers in Catholic Schools in north Belfast; all teachers, cleaning staff, all principals, any Catholic who works in these schools, we are considering legitimate targets. We will shoot them (sic)." The caller claimed that the schools and those that worked in them were "antagonising the loyalist community". The caller gave the same code word that had been given by the RHD in claiming the murders of Ciaran Cummings and Gavin Brett in July 2001 (See July 2001 attacks).

January 12 Saturday. 4.45am. Loyalist paramilitaries shot and killed 20-year-old Catholic postal worker Daniel McColgan as he arrived for work at the Royal Mail sorting office in the loyalist Rathcoole estate in north Belfast. The murder came just hours after the Red Hand Defenders (RHD) had issued a warning that all Catholic school staff were legitimate targets. The murder was initially claimed by the Red Hand Defenders (RHD), a cover name used by the UDA/UFF and the LVF. The Rathcoole estate is widely known to be a UDA stronghold, and the killing was later claimed directly by the UDA. Daniel McColgan, who as a DJ sometimes worked in the local British Legion Club, lived with his partner and their one-year-old baby daughter in the nearby Longlands estate. (BBC, IN, IN, Obs, BT,CW)

The RUC/PSNI seized what they claimed was an INLA arms cache in the New Lodge area of north Belfast. They found a sub-machine gun, a shot gun, a large quantity of ammunition, four steel-cased pipe-bombs packed with ball-bearings and nails, an anti-personnel mine containing high explosives and two detonators. The INLA’s political wing, the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP), denied that the weapons belonged to the INLA. Eddie McClean, a community worker from the loyalist Tiger’s Bay area said that the find "proves the point that there is no organisation on our side involved in these attacks". (IN, NBN, CW, RUC/PSNI)

The DUP’s Sammy Wilson blamed nationalist west Belfast for the rise in crime in south Belfast. Sinn Fein councillors branded his comments as "racist bigotry". (SBN)

January 13, Sunday.
Loyalists from the Tiger’s Bay end of Hallidays Road in north Belfast threw blast bombs at Catholic homes in Duncairn Gardens, leading to calls for the interface security gates to be closed. (IN, CW)

Loyalists carried out arson attacks on St Bride’s Primary School in south Belfast and on St Patrick’s High School in Lisburn. Both schools suffered substantial damage. (IN, CW, BBC, RUC/PSNI)

Loyalists from the Hallidays Road area of north Belfast threw a pipe bomb at a Catholic family travelling by car to the cinema. The family said there was no trouble in the area at the time and that they had been targeted because the direction they were travelling from suggested to their attackers that they were Catholics. The bomb exploded a short distance from the car but the driver managed to remain in control. No one was injured. (IN, CW, NBN)

January 14, Monday.
The Irish News condemned those unionist politicians who, it said, had remained "remarkably silent" over the murder of Daniel McColgan. The same issue blamed a UDA/UFF leader from Rathcoole for the murder. The report said that "the UFF’s South East Antrim Brigadier who cannot be named for legal reasons, was convicted of the attempted murder of a leading republican in the early 1980s and is one of the UDA’s representatives with General John de Chastelain’s international decommissioning body." (IN)

U.S. special envoy to the north of Ireland Richard Haass called on the RUC/PSNI to do everything in its power to tackle loyalist violence. (IN, BBC, RTE).

Four loyalists were arrested in connection with the murder of Daniel McColgan. Two were released shortly afterwards. (IN, NBN, RUC/PSNI)

Mail Deliveries across Northern Ireland were halted as postal workers staged a 24-hour stoppage as a mark of respect for Daniel McColgan. (BBC, IN)

The RUC/PSNI released two men they had arrested in connection with the UDA’s murder of Daniel McColgan and brought two more in for questioning. One of those held was Tommy Kirkham, a Newtownabbey councillor for the now defunct UDP. He was released the next day. (IN, NBN, CW, BBC)

Royal Mail management closed the Rathcoole depot where Daniel McGolgan was murdered with a view to permanently moving its operations elsewhere. Nearly 750 RUC/PSNI "commandos" took up position around Catholic schools in north Belfast. The move came in response to attacks on the schools, to the RHD/UDA/UFF threat against staff at Catholic schools, and to the murder of Daniel McColgan. (IN, BBC, G)

It was announced that a new political group had been formed to replace the Ulster Democratic Party (UDP), the political wing of the UDA/UFF recently disbanded by the paramilitary organisation. Part of the Ulster Political Representation Group (UPRG) opening statement read, "The UPRG acknowledges the efforts of the Ulster Defence Association in helping to stabilise interface areas, while under severe provocation." (DN, IN, LS)

January 15, Tuesday.
Thousands attended the funeral of murdered postman Daniel McColgan, at which uniformed postal workers formed a guard of honour. (IN, BBC, NL,RTE)

200,000 postal workers in Britain observed a two-minute silence as a mark of respect for Daniel McColgan, while northern Irish postal workers observed a further 24-hour stoppage. The Irish Congress of Trades Unions (ICTU) called for a mass strike on Friday 18th January. (IN, BBC)

At a press conference in Belfast, a masked spokesman for the UFF/UDA, while not denying the murder of Daniel McColgan, condemned the death threats issued to schoolteachers and postal workers. He also issued a UFF/UDA order for the Red Hand Defenders to stand down. The RHD is a cover name for the UFF/UDA. (IN)

The IRSP and the INLA denounced the death threat issued in the name of the INLA against Protestant workers at a Marks and Spencer’s store in Belfast as a Special Branch dirty tricks fabrication designed to make it look like there was a "tit-for-tat" sectarian war. (AN, IN, NBN)

British Government statistics revealed that since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement loyalists have been responsible for more than 500 bomb attacks and 540 gun attacks, while republicans have been responsible for 80 bomb attacks and 237 gun attacks. (IN, Hansard)

January 16, Wednesday.
Steven McCullough, a UDA man who had been taken into Musgrave Street RUC/PSNI station after he had offered information on the murder of Daniel McColgan, was found dead three hours after leaving the station. It initially appeared that Mr McCullough died after falling from a cliff near Cavehill Road. The Office of the Police Ombudsman subsequently appealed for anyone with information to contact them. (IN, BT,NL,)

U.S. special envoy Richard Haass called for zero tolerance towards violence from paramilitaries. The call focused on loyalists, whom he acknowledged as posing the greatest threat to the peace process. (IN)

In "response" to the warning from the UFF/UDA on January 15, the Red Hand Defenders said they would stand down by midnight. (IN)

Templemore Secondary School, the only state secondary school on Derry’s west bank attended by significant numbers of Protestants, announced its imminent closure. The announcement came shortly after Foyle and Londonderry College, the other "Protestant" Grammar school on the west bank announced plans to relocate to the east bank. The DUP’s Gregory Campbell said that pressure on Protestants to move from the west bank of the city was the result of a campaign of intimidation by the IRA. This is hotly disputed in the city. Sinn Féin, the SDLP, the UUP and the DUP as well as community groups expressed concern at the closure. (DN, IN)

Face-to-face talks were held in north Belfast between Holy Cross parents and Glenbryn residents in a bid to find a way forward after serious rioting the previous week. The parents said that the fact that the two sides were meeting face-to-face was a positive move. The Department of Health announced a pay out of £100,000 to develop trauma-counselling services in north Belfast’s interface areas. (NBN, CW)

The mother of Glen Branagh, the teenage member of the UDA’s youth wing who died when a pipe bomb he was throwing exploded in November 2001, appealed for those sending her hate mail to stop. (NBN) (See November 2001)

January 17, Thursday.
The British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, John Reid, attended a meeting in London with Justice Henry Barron, the Irish judge conducting an inquiry into the 1974 Dublin/Monaghan bombings. The bombs in Dublin and Monaghan killed 33 people, making May 24 1974 the bloodiest day in the current conflict, and were ostensibly the work of loyalist paramilitaries, although it is widely believed that the loyalist gang were working in close cooperation with elements of the security forces in the North. Since the inquiry began, the British authorities have continually refused to co-operate with requests made by Justice Barron to hand over relevant documents held by them. After the meeting John Reid told the press that the RUC/PSNI were co-operating with requests for forensic files. The reassurance was dismissed by the relatives group Justice for the Forgotten who stressed that what had been requested were files being held by central government in Whitehall. (IN, BBC, IT)

The Victims’ group Relatives for Justice met US special envoy to the north of Ireland Richard Haass, presenting him with information on cases of killings by loyalist paramilitaries where there was state collusion. (IN)

Bernadette McQuillan, sister of murdered Lurgan solicitor Rosemary Nelson, branded the British government’s proposal to appoint an international judge to look at her murder along with Pat Finucane’s "a stalling device" to avoid a proper inquiry. There is compelling evidence that both Rosemary Nelson and Pat Finucane were killed by loyalists with the help of the state. (IN)

The Irish News carried an article marking the January 17 anniversary of the 1992 IRA bomb in Teebane, Co Tyrone, in which eight Protestant builders travelling to work on a British Army base were killed. Those who died were William Gary Bleeks (35), Cecil James Caldwell (37), Robert Dunseith (25), David Harkness (23), John Richard McConnell (38), Nigel McKee (22), Robert Irons (61) and Oswald Gilchrist (44). Six others were injured. (IN)

January 18, Friday.
Thousands of workers stopped work for a half a day throughout the north to attend rallies against sectarianism called in the wake of the murder of Daniel McColgan. Leaders of the four main churches joined trades unionists and politicians from across the political spectrum at rallies attended by over 30,000 people in Belfast, Derry, Omagh, Newry, Enniskillen, Cookstown and Strabane. The Belfast rally was attended by the First and Deputy First Ministers as well as Ulster Unionist, SDLP, and Sinn Féin members of the executive. Stormont Ministers Peter Robinson and Nigel Dodds, from the DUP, were conspicuously absent. Mr Robinson, the Minister for Regional Development, was said to be on "departmental business" while his colleague Nigel Dodds, who is Minister for Social Development and was Daniel McColgan’s MP, had "ministerial commitments". John White, convicted sectarian killer and former spokesperson for the now defunct UDP, said he had mixed feelings about the rallies. (IN, BT,NL)

The head of the Human Rights Commission, Professor Brice Dickson, announced his support for the calls for a fully independent judicial inquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane. Prof. Dickson said he was now convinced that there was security force collusion in the 1989 UDA murder of the Belfast solicitor. (IN)

The RUC/PSNI recovered what is believed to be a loyalist arms cache in Ballymena. (RUC/PSNI, CW)

Amnesty International said that it was "alarmed by the escalating level of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland in recent weeks and urges the government, police, political and community leaders to take action to address the increasing violence which is resulting in grave human rights abuses". The statement was issued in the wake of the murder of Daniel McColgan and the loyalist threats issued against Catholic workers. The full statement can be found at: http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/print/EUR450012002?OpenDocument

Nationalists petrol bombed the home of an elderly Protestant resident of Whitewell Road in north Belfast. It is thought that the pensioner’s home was targeted because of the wreath left outside to mark the spot where Thomas McDonald was knocked down and killed. Thomas McDonald was the 16-year-old Protestant youth who was knocked down by a car in September 2000. A 36-year-old north Belfast woman is currently awaiting trial for the killing. The attack on the pensioners home was followed by intensive rioting in north Belfast, with confrontations breaking out in the Shore Road, Mill Road and Bawnmore areas. (IN)

The RUC/PSNI recovered petrol bombs in Mulderg Drive and White City in north Belfast, after petrol bombs were thrown at Catholic homes in Serpentine Gardens and Gunnel Hill. (RUC/PSNI)

January 19, Saturday.
The South Belfast News reported that three Catholic builders working in the mainly protestant Eglantine area had received death threats from the Red Hand Defenders. (SBN)

January 21, Monday.
Loyalists from White City attacked a number of families who were on their way to a vigil in memory of Daniel McColgan. (NBN, CW)

The Northern Ireland Assembly voted to call on the British Government to hand over all relevant documents to Irish Supreme Court Justice Barron’s Commission of Inquiry into the 1974 loyalist bombs in Dublin and Monaghan in which British involvement is strongly suspected. (see January 17) (IN, BBC)

January 23, Wednesday.
Secretary of State John Reid promised to take strong measures against loyalist paramilitaries. (IN)

January 24, Thursday.
It was reported in the Irish News that the UDA/UFF’s south-east Antrim "Brigadier", who served a prison sentence for the attempted murder of Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams, left Belfast shortly after the murder of Catholic postal worker Daniel McColgan. It is understood that the man, who was one of the UDA’s representatives to General de Chastelain’s decommissioning body, travelled to Glasgow to watch a Rangers football match just hours after the murder, where he was then arrested for a public order offence. There have been widespread allegations that the UFF/UDA gang that killed Daniel McColgan are the main importers of drugs into the north of Ireland. It is believed the gang were working with the British neo-nazi group Combat 18 to bring class "A" drugs through Scotland into the north, via Portrush. The gang is thought to be responsible for the murder of two Scottish drug dealers in October 2001. (see January 29) (IN)

Loyalists attacked three Catholic homes in Larne, Co Antrim. (IN)

Bomb disposal experts carried out controlled explosions on an abandoned car in Lurgan, while a device left at the home of SDLP MLA Brid Rogers, also in Lurgan, was identified as an "elaborate hoax."(IN)

January 25, Friday.
The RUC/PSNI discovered several crates of petrol bombs and paint bombs on Longlands Road in Newtownabbey, north Belfast. (RUC/PSNI)

January 26, Saturday.
The Parades Commission held a "cross-community" seminar on contentious parades in the mainly loyalist town of Templepatrick. The event, which was jointly hosted by the Community Relations Council and INCORE, went ahead in spite of death threats against members of the Lower Ormeau Concerned Citizens and the Garvaghy Road Residents, which forced them to withdraw from the conference. The threats came in the form of packages containing live ammunition. The organisers also came in for criticism for failing to invite representatives from a number of key nationalist residents groups in flashpoint areas. The Pat Finucane Centre, who have monitored contentious parades over a number of years and who have a considerable amount of documentation on the issue, were also not invited, despite direct requests to the organisers from residents groups. (AN, IN)

SDLP Councillors in Larne accused the RUC/PSNI of engaging in collusion with loyalists by not responding adequately to a recent spate of sectarian attacks in the town. (IN)

Belfast councillor Frank McCoubrey, formerly a member of the now defunct UDP, said he had been told by the RUC/PSNI that he was on a republican hit list. (IN)

It emerged that the UDA in Belfast had targeted four republicans, including two councillors. (IN, CW)

UDA commanders were reported to be "scrambling" to divert funds from the drugs trade and racketeering into legitimate business following the announcement of new legislation enabling the RUC/PSNI to seize assets that cannot be proven to have been bought legitimately. (IN)

The South Belfast News reported a "vicious" sectarian attack during which loyalists attacked a 43-year-old Catholic from the Lower Ormeau Road with a concrete block. The man was taken to hospital where he received 38 stitches to his head. (SBN)

January 27, Sunday.
Loyalists petrol bombed the home and car of trade unionist and anti-sectarian activist Gerry McCullough. Mr McCullough who was photographed at the protests after Daniel McColgan’s murder wearing a gas mask and holding a placard with the slogan "sectarianism stinks", said that he was saddened about not being able to bring up his family in a mixed environment. (IN, BBC)

January 28, Monday.
Nationalists are thought to have been responsible for a fire at Dundrod Orange Hall, near Lisburn. The fire gutted part of the building. (IN)

There were reports of renewed death threats against Catholic teachers in north and west Belfast. A group calling itself the "Loyalist Reaction Force" was believed to have sent the threats to a television newsroom. (IN)

Loyalist gunmen attempted to murder a Catholic postal worker when his car was stopped at traffic lights at the junction of Ligoniel Road and Crumlin Road in north Belfast. The 20 year old, a close friend of Glengormley teenager Gavin Brett who was murdered by the UDA (see July 29, 2001), sped off when the gunmen approached him. He has now moved out of his house for fear of being targeted again. (NBN, CW)

January 29, Tuesday.
Catholic residents of the mixed religion Longlands estate in north Belfast – the estate where murdered postal worker Daniel McColgan lived – were reportedly boarding up their windows and moving out in the face of increasing attacks by loyalists. (IN, CW)

The Irish News named John Gregg as the UDA/UFF’s south-east Antrim "Brigadier" and the north’s main drugs baron, and as the man believed to be responsible for the murder of Daniel McColgan. The paper also revealed that Gregg had been arrested in Scotland on public order charges shortly after the murder (see January 24). (IN)

Loyalists petrol bombed a Catholic home in Burmah Street in the Ormeau Road area. (IN, CW)

January 30, Wednesday.
Two Protestant employees of a Derry city centre store, who had been permitted to take a tea break rather than have to participate in a minute’s silence being held in honour of the Bloody Sunday dead, had been "singled out" according to the DUP’s Gregory Campbell. In the same edition of the Londonderry Sentinel, a weekly newspaper serving the unionist population in the north-west, no mention was made of the anniversary of Bloody Sunday which occurred on the day of publication. The following week no mention was made of the march attended by an estimated 40,000 people in the city. This is included to illustrate the difference in reporting of the Bloody Sunday issue across the sectarian fault line. (LS, PFC)

Proposals to bring in a policy for promoting the Irish language in Derry would only serve to alienate Protestants in the city, according to DUP MP and MLA Gregory Campbell. (DJ)

The RUC/PSNI found two replica firearms and a large quantity of ammunition during a house search in Island Street in the loyalist Newtownards Road area in east Belfast. They also found a "quantity of white powder, weighing scales and other items associated with drugs". (IN)

Unionist councillors Ernie and Mary Hamilton called for the installation of CCTV cameras around St Columb’s Church of Ireland Cathedral on Derry’s mainly Catholic cityside. The call, which echoes that of the Dean of the Cathedral, follows a spate of acts of vandalism. The news reports did not specify whether the motivation for the vandalism was sectarian or not. (LS, IN)

The Londonderry Sentinel reported a claim by the PUP that nationalist youths had stoned school buses in rural areas and daubed graffiti on loyalist murals. (LS)

It emerged that Barry Bradbury, a key contact within loyalism of murdered journalist Martin O’Hagan, is to have bullet-proof windows and CCTV installed at his home by the NIO following threats to his life by the LVF. Bradbury is best known for producing T-shirts parodying the Flintstones cartoon series, which showed Fred Flintstone carrying an automatic weapon alongside the slogan "Yabba Dabba Doo, Any Fenian Will Do." (IN)

A west Belfast bus driver who is an outspoken opponent of sectarian intimidation vowed not to stop work after the latest in a series of loyalist death threats issued against him. Sean Smyth, a trade unionist and socialist, received the threat at the same time as neighbour and Sinn Féin MLA Alex Maskey was the victim of an elaborate pipe bomb hoax. The west Belfast representative blamed the UDA. (IN, AN)

Eoin O Broin, the Sinn Fein representative for Oldpark in north Belfast, announced he was submitting a report to the police Ombudsman about the number of sectarian attacks in the area. Cllr O Broin expressed concern at the plight of residents of the Ligoniel enclave in particular where there had been 16 serious attacks in the previous few weeks. (NBN)

Sources:

Sectarian attacks section

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