Three shot during two days of Northern Ireland rioting
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
London, June 22, IRNA -- A press photographer has become the latest victim in a new wave of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland when he was shot in the leg during the second successive night of rioting in predominately Protestant east Belfast.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) issued a warning to the media to stay away from the area for their own safety, shortly before the PA news agency confirmed that one of its photographers had been shot and had been taken to hospital.
The unrest, blamed on Protestant paramilitary, followed similar disturbances on Monday night, when police said a total of 11 shots were fired and two men were wounded.
On the second night, several hundred people reportedly gathered near a Catholic enclave, some with petrol bombs, as masked youths pelted each other with stones and fireworks.
Police brought in water cannon and used baton rounds after shots were fired and bricks and bottles hit their lines. Two men were also said to have suffered burn injuries.
Chief Superintendent Alan McCrum of the PSNI said that members of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), a pro-British loyalist paramilitary group, had been involved in planning the disorder.
Belfast's mayor, Niall Ó Donnghaile said there was no doubt that the violence, resulting in a number of Catholic residents being injured, was “unprovoked and was a carefully orchestrated and planned attack on the area.'
East Belfast has been the scene of sporadic and often intense sectarian violence in the past although instances have been relatively rare as elsewhere on the streets of Northern Ireland since the Good Friday peace agreement 13 years ago.
In recent months, splinter IRA groups have carried out a small-scale series of bombings and attacks, who like some sections of the UVF are disillusioned with the peace process.
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