Four-year-old Holly Reynolds holds a placard at a peace rally at Belfast City Hall yesterday. The rally followed another night of violent protests as loyalists renewed their anger against restrictions on flying the union flag from Belfast City Hall.
AFP/Belfast
Northern Ireland’s first minister insisted yesterday that the political process is the only way forward after one of the heaviest days yet of violence over the flying of the British flag.
Twenty-nine police officers were injured on Saturday as they used water cannon and plastic bullets to quell the latest in five weeks of protests by pro-British loyalists from the Protestant community.
First Minister Peter Robinson told the rioters that violence would not achieve their aims and that the political process that began with the 1998 Good Friday agreement was the only solution to the problem.
“The only way forward in Northern Ireland is through the political process. It’s endorsed overwhelmingly by the people in Northern Ireland,” Robinson said on BBC television.
Northern Ireland has been swept with a wave of sometimes violent protests since December 3, when Belfast City Council voted to restrict the number of days the British flag is flown at City Hall to 18 per year.
Loyalists see the council’s decision as an attack on their identity as part of the United Kingdom, and an unacceptable concession to republicans seeking a united Ireland.
But Robinson said: “The flag at Belfast City Council is not going to go up because somebody threw a petrol bomb at a policeman.
“The only way forward is through the political process and we are trying to encourage people to engage in that and we are trying to bring forward channels so that we can talk to people on the ground.”
Robinson criticised the council’s “bad” decision to change the flag rules but said violence was not the answer.