Terrorism in Ulster

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32603, 11 May 1971, Page 19

Terrorism in Ulster

fN.Z Press Assn—Copyright)

BELFAST, May 10.

Terrorists in Ulster struck during the night with explosives and firebombs, killing the mother of a militant Protestant leader and starting fires in Belfast department stores and shops. The police say that the attacks were apparently carried out by Irish Republican extremists.

Mrs Isabella McKeague.i aged 73, died when flames en-| gulfed her Belfast flat after a gelignite bomb had been I thrown into a shop below shortly before midnight. Mrs McKeague shared the, flat with her son. John, the 'leader of the Shankill Defence

(Committee established bymilitant Protestants to defend their residential area against attacks by Roman Catholics. iHe was not at home. ! Two men who tried to rescue Mr McKeague’s mother suffered bums. The police also report that' 28 fire-bombs were found ini department stores, a supermarket, and two shops during the night. Some of the bombs exploded, but there were no injuries and only slight damage. A man with shotgun wounds in his head was found before dawn in a Belfast shopping district, and was taken |to hospital in a serious condition. I In County Antrim during the night, extremists blew up a temporary bridge between the village of Lisburn and ; Nutt’s Comer. No-one was hurt.

The police say that the incidents appeared to be part of a campaign by Irish Republican extremists to wreck the month-long Ulster ”71 Festival. due to open in Belfast on Friday. i The festival aims at promoting tourism and industrial and business investment in strife-tom Northern Ireland. “Evidently the subversive extremists want to scare tourists and businessmen away,” a police spokesman said. One of Britain’s largest hotel chains has announced that the unrest in Northern Ireland has prompted it to sell six of its hotels in the province. "Ulster is not the best place to be in business at the moment,” Mr Maxwell Joseph, chairman of the Grand Metropolitan Hotels Group, .commented.