Rampaging youths go on wild riot through Ulster cities

Press, 11 August 1979, Page 8

Rampaging youths go on wild riot through Ulster cities

NZPA ” Belfast Mobs of Roman Catholic youths have gone on a rampage in west Belfast and Londonderry in a return to the street rioting that erupted in Northern Ireland a decade ago.

'sons detained were Catholics. most of them suspected 'members of the Irish Republican Army which is ! campaigning to oust the | British and unite the province with the Irish Republic. Today. Protestants will (Stage their annual apprentice boys march through Londonderry to commemorate a 1689 Protestant victory over the Catholic forces of King James 11. The apprentice march in 1969 touched off the current spate of sectarian fighting which has claimed nearly 2000 lives and injured more than 21,000. It also led the British Government to send in Army troops on August 14, 1969. Since then, 301 have been sent home in coffins. Some 13.500 remain star tioned in the province. In London tomorrow, demonstrators including the Catholic civil rights leader, Bernadette Devlin-McAlis-ey, plan a troops-out march to coincide with protests in the province.

Buses and cars were hi-’ jacked and set alight, British ; troops were bombarded with stones, bricks, and paint,; and there were several gun battles between soldiers and ' hidden terrorists. Security forces said the; trouble had been contained, < and after more than 24 hours of violence beginning! on Wednesday night, there) had been no deaths and only!] one serious injury. Therej were five arrests, the police said. “We haven’t had a lot of rioting lately, not honest-to- 1 goodness rioting like this,” I said a police spokesman. “It’s really going back to' seven or eight years ago when we used to have regu-( lar hand-to-hand combat.” The spokesman said most'< of the trouble came from! gangs of youths, ranging in ; number from 15 to 80. i They launched aljout 10 i attacks on police and troops, including an incident inii Catholic west Belfast in], which two armoured ve-|1 hides on patrol were am- u

bushed and three soldiers in-ii jured. 1 In Londonderry's Catholic i Bogside district, demonstra-1 j itors put up barricades simi-li lar to those erected in 1969! when the Bogside was a no-ji go area. But only about 150) 'Catholics showed up, on a i rainy day for a march de- 1 I manding the withdrawal of i (British troops from the I province. I • Rioters in Belfast and . ! Londonderry, some wearing i (hoods, hijacked about 20 ve- | hides and used them to : (block roads before setting i (them alight. i The events were sparked 1 'by the eighth anniversary of i intemment-without-trial. a l i harsh anti-terrorist tool in- . I traduced by the British Government on August 9, 1971. I It was ended on December I 5, 1975. but not before deep t resentment had set in among militant Catholics in the < Prote'stant-dominated prov- > |ince. . During the four years and four months of internment, t ‘all but 107 of the 1981 per- t