Feb. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Irish republicans set vehicles alight
in Dublin's city center, looted stores and hurled stones and
missiles at police in some of the worst street violence since the
country acceded from British rule 84 years ago.
As many as 300 protesters, seeking to block loyalists from
Northern Ireland staging their first march in the city since
1936, clashed with about 100 riot police on O'Connell Street and
Nassau Street, close to government buildings. Forty people were
arrested, and six police officers and eight civilians were
injured, police said.
Republican Sinn Fein, a breakaway group from the Sinn Fein
political movement, organized the protest to counter a loyalist
demonstration, which ended up being abandoned. Loyalist
protesters say the Irish government has too much influence over
the North under a 1998 accord that helped start negotiations to
end the conflict.
Loyalist protesters ``knew what was going to happen if they
tried to do this,'' said Kelly Ann Moore, 20, a republican
protester wearing an Irish flag around her waist. ``They were
trying to provoke this violence.''
The troubles, as they are known in Ireland, have claimed at
least 3,500 lives since 1969. Nationalists and republicans want a
united Ireland, while unionists and loyalists advocate continued
alliance with Britain.
More than 1,000 loyalists had planned to join the march,
which was organized by a group representing victims of republican
terrorism, Families Acting For Innocent Relatives. The Armagh,
Northern Ireland-based group said it agreed a route with the
Dublin Police Department for the parade. Politicians from the
Democratic Unionist Party and the Ulster Unionist Party in
Northern Ireland planned to join the march.
Shop Windows Smashed
Trouble flared at 12:45 p.m. when republicans blocked
loyalists from beginning their march down O'Connell Street, the
main shopping street in the north of the city. Rioters smashed
windows at stores including a McDonald's Corp. restaurant. A
Locker Room sports store was looted, police said.
Republican protesters continued down O'Connell Street in a
bid to reach government buildings. Two cars opposite Trinity
College were torched, and windows on other vehicles smashed, as
police, some on horseback, blocked access to the Kildare Street
parliament.
Rioters, some bearing Ireland's tricolor flag and chanting
republican slogans, smashed a window at an office belonging to
the Progressive Democrats, a political party allied to Fianna
Fail in the ruling coalition, using a café table. Stores along
the street closed.
Riot police pushed protesters down the quays away from the
city center. O'Connell Street and nearby College Green were
closed to traffic, as municipal workers cleared debris.
Adams: `Unjustifiable'
``It is the essence of Irish democracy and republicanism
that people are allowed to express their views freely and in a
peaceful manner,'' Prime Minister Bertie Ahern said, according to
state broadcaster, RTE.
Sinn Fein denied any involvement with the violence, the BBC
reported.
``There is no justification for what happened this afternoon
in Dublin,'' Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams said in a statement.
``Sinn Fein had appealed to people to ignore this loyalist parade
and not to be provoked by it. Our view was that it should not be
opposed in any way and we made that clear.''