12 November 1998 Edition
Loyalist rampage
Residents on the Broadway Road in West Belfast have been the latest victims of the upsurge in loyalist violence over the past two weeks.
At 3.35am on Tuesday morning a gang smashed the windows of ten homes and vandalised a car as they made their way from the top of the road down towards the Village area, a loyalist stronghold. The homes of three pensioners were among those attacked
A member of the residents committee, who did not want her name used, said, ``In the 22 years I've lived here I've never seen anything like it.'' Residents reported that the gang of at least three men in their mid to late 20s hurled sectarian abuse as they attacked the area using a variety of weapons, including welding hammers.
A resident claimed that the RUC failed to appear on the scene for at least 30 minutes and then they removed a coat left behind, a welding hammer and the damaged car. ``We could have been burned in our beds,'' she said.
SF councillor, Tom Hartley said, ``this area and the Village, where the gang came from, is overlooked by a British army watchtower on top of the nurses' home, yet the attackers carried out the damage unhindered. This attack, coming at a time of increased attacks by loyalists across Belfast, is reminiscent of the cycle of violence created to suppress the rights of nationalists.''
At 3.35am on Tuesday morning a gang smashed the windows of ten homes and vandalised a car as they made their way from the top of the road down towards the Village area, a loyalist stronghold. The homes of three pensioners were among those attacked
A member of the residents committee, who did not want her name used, said, ``In the 22 years I've lived here I've never seen anything like it.'' Residents reported that the gang of at least three men in their mid to late 20s hurled sectarian abuse as they attacked the area using a variety of weapons, including welding hammers.
A resident claimed that the RUC failed to appear on the scene for at least 30 minutes and then they removed a coat left behind, a welding hammer and the damaged car. ``We could have been burned in our beds,'' she said.
SF councillor, Tom Hartley said, ``this area and the Village, where the gang came from, is overlooked by a British army watchtower on top of the nurses' home, yet the attackers carried out the damage unhindered. This attack, coming at a time of increased attacks by loyalists across Belfast, is reminiscent of the cycle of violence created to suppress the rights of nationalists.''