Talks to stem violence may yield little

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON, SEPT. 5. The situation in Northern Ireland worsened today and there were fears that it could spiral out of control after a bomb exploded in Ardoyne, north Belfast, where Protestant and Catholics have been engaged in a bitter row over a disputed route to a school.

For the third day in a row, young Catholic girls were jeered and abused as they nervously walked through a ``security corridor'', erected by the police, to reach the school which lies in the heart of a Protestant neighbourhood.

Commentators warned of the long-term political consequences of the rising sectarian tension which has led to violent clashes and reprisal attacks by the two communities.

Loyalists threatened ``an-eye-for-eye'' after a Protestant teenager was knocked down and killed by a Catholic motorist on Tuesday.

The boy, who had been throwing stones at Catholics, was chased by a woman motorist and mowed down in what the police were treating as murder.

The violence prompted calls for a political initiative to kickstart the stalled peace process. Observers believed that the sudden eruption of violence was a direct result of the political vacuum following the resignation of the Unionist leader, Mr. David Trimble from the provincial Government over the issue of arms decommissioning by the IRA.

They said armed extremist groups, opposed to the peace process, were exploiting the political crisis by playing on the deep- seated sectarian prejudices.

The Unionists, who have been demanding that the IRA should give up its weapons, were widely seen to have damaged their cause by targeting Catholic schoolchildren at a time when pressure on the republicans to disarm was growing.

``After what happened on the Ardoyne Road this week, however, why should any republican militant feel under any pressure at all to cooperate,'' The Guardian asked.

The demonstration of Protestant hatred, it pointed out, was likely to have a negative impact on political opinion which had begun to appreciate the Unionists' viewpoint on decommissioning. The Times was equally vehement that the behaviour of loyalist protesters was ``foul'' and ``unacceptable''.

Analysts drew parallels between what is going on in north Belfast and the scenes of racial hatred in America's Deep South in 1957 when white racists bullied and jeered black girls going to a school in Little Rock. The Holy Cross Primary School in Ardoyne could become Northern Ireland's Little Rock, one newspaper warned.

Fears of a negative political fallout were also beginning to haunt the Unionist/loyalist leadership and for the first time, there was an attempt to distance the ``movement'' from what were sought to be portrayed as ``individual'' acts of Protestant residents of north Belfast. Mr. Trimble denounced the violence and said there was a ``serious danger'' that the trouble could spread to other areas. Mr. Billy Hutchinson, a leading Progressive Unionist legislator, who had earlier said loyalists were simply ``reacting'' to the republicans' intimidating tactics sounded more contrite today. He said he was ``sickened'' by what was going on and was ``ashamed to be called a loyalist''.

The Northern Ireland Security Minister, Ms. Jane Kennedy was holding talks with political and community leaders today in a bid to defuse the situation, but given the surcharged mood on both sides, prospects of an early end to the tension looked slim.

Meanwhile, the blast this morning, in which two police officers were injured, happened when parents were escorting their children to the beleaguered Holy Cross school.

Protestants object to the Catholics walking past their homes to reach the school, and want them to use another route. Their complaint is that IRA men are using the children as a ``cover'' to encroach on loyalist territory and stir up trouble.

Catholics, on the other hand, maintain that the approach road to the school is public property and as residents of the area they have a right to use it. The explosion, which caused great panic, followed a night of violence during which loyalists set fire to police vehicles and attacked security forces.

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Section  : International
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