A van was set ablaze and rammed towards Paul Sharkey’s home as masked men walked up his street, setting fire to houses in a second night of disorder that has left Belfast residents “petrified”.
“It was terrifying,” Sharkey told BBC News NI. “A van was sat alight and pushed towards my home. I hardly slept a wink.”
“Masked men set homes alight in second night of Belfast violence; 12 police injured, 16 arrested.”
The violence, which police say injured 12 officers and led to 16 arrests, followed a knife attack on Monday that left Stephen Ogilvie, a man in his 40s, with serious injuries including the loss of an eye. The suspect, Sudanese national Hadi Alodid, 30, has been remanded in custody after being charged with attempted murder.
On Wednesday night, rioters attacked police with bricks, bottles and a petrol bomb at a major roundabout north-west of Belfast. Police deployed water cannon to disperse a crowd of around 200 masked youths in Newtownabbey, after a lorry was torched near a migrant hotel. Homes, cars and a bus were set alight.
A nurse “of different skin colour” was chased and intimidated on her way to work at Ulster Hospital in Dundonald, according to her union. Two Ugandan care workers described being “scared and traumatised” as they were trapped while houses burned.
Karen, whose daughter Rachel videoed the knife attack, said her 26-year-old daughter is now receiving death threats from people who say she should have done more to help. “When you’re a young 26-year-old girl – I don’t know what else she was supposed to do,” Karen told The Nolan Show. “Every time she closes her eyes she still sees exactly what went on.”
Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn called the rioting “racist thuggery”, saying it is unacceptable that people are being targeted because of the colour of their skin. Kim Leadbeater, sister of murdered MP Jo Cox, urged people not to “create chaos”, adding: “It’s devastating to see homes set alight.”
Ogilvie’s family said he is in a stable condition and urged people to stop spreading “false information”, saying they were left “feeling disgusted” by the disorder. Clean-up operations are under way in the Greater Belfast area, but residents like Sharkey say they remain terrified to stay in their homes.