29 March 2001 Edition
RUC attack St Patrick's Day revellers
As many as six young people, including two young women, were badly beaten and seven were arrested in RUC-provoked trouble in Belfast on St Patrick's Day. One first year nationalist student from Queen's University was later abandoned on the loyalist Shankill Road by the RUC.
The trouble flared at the end of a day, which saw heavy RUC patrolling around a number of pubs in the University area of Belfast where young nationalist people were celebrating St Patrick's Day.
Sinn Féin's Sean Hayes said afterwards: ``For the third year in a row the RUC has provoked and assaulted revellers in the heartland of Belfast's University area on St. Patrick's night. It is typical of this force that any celebration of nationalism is intolerable and will be met with violence.''
The trouble flared at the end of a day, which saw heavy RUC patrolling around a number of pubs in the University area of Belfast where young nationalist people were celebrating St Patrick's Day.
Sinn Féin's Sean Hayes said afterwards: ``For the third year in a row the RUC has provoked and assaulted revellers in the heartland of Belfast's University area on St. Patrick's night. It is typical of this force that any celebration of nationalism is intolerable and will be met with violence.''