Sectarian violence erupts for second night in north Belfast

The sectarian violence in north Belfast that left 48 police officers injured last night has erupted again.

A police spokesman said that officers have come under attack from a nationalist mob of 250 to 300 people at the Brompton Park interface. At least 20 petrol bombs and a blast bomb were thrown by the rioters and a number of people have been arrested.

He said they were now being held apart from a gang of around 60 loyalists, who assembled at nearby Twaddel Avenue and also attacked police with stones, bottles and other missiles.

He added the three vans that were hijacked in separate locations near the Ardoyne Road earlier today were now on fire on the Crumlin Road.

A pregnant bus-driver escaped injury when a hammer was held to her head during a hijacking this evening.

The spokesman said the woman, who was freed unharmed but badly shaken, was ordered to drive to Ardoyne Avenue by a gang of men who boarded the bus at around 7.00 p.m. The badly-damaged bus was later recovered by police.

Politicians and church leaders earlier appealed for calm following another day of disturbances in the area.

North Ireland's First Minister Mr David Trimble and his deputy, Mr Mark Durkan, condemned the violence and called for restraint and common sense from all sides.

"We condemn without reservation the disturbances yesterday and the disgraceful attacks on property at Mercy School today," they said in a joint statement.

They were referring to the attack by a group of loyalists outside a girls' Catholic school that left 17 parked cars badly damaged.

A police spokesman said six men, two of whom were armed, carried out the attack at the Lady of Mercy Secondary School in the predominantly Protestant Ballysillam area, half a mile from Holy Cross School in Ardoyne.

Some parents took their children away from the school, many vowing to keep them at home tomorrow.

Sinn Féin's Mr Martin McGuinness, who was visiting the Ardoyne area, said the latest series of attacks had brought people to the point of despair.

"Everybody concerned with the education of our children has to be appalled and disgusted by this unacceptable deterioration of the situation."

And Protestant schoolboys in north Belfast were ferried home by police Land Rovers this afternoon because of threats from nationalist crowds.

Pupils from the Boy's Model Secondary School were stranded off the Crumlin Road on the wrong side of the nationalist crowd in Ardoyne after buses which normally take them home were withdrawn because of yesterday's violence.

Holy Cross school will reopen "in the interests of the staff and pupils" tomorrow morning, the chairman of the Board of Governors, Fr Aidan Troy said tonight.

He said the decision was taken this afternoon following meetings with the police, the school's board and the North's security minister, Ms Jane Kennedy.

He went on to address a meeting of parents at a neighbouring school and said it would be for them to decide whether to take their children to the school in the morning.

The school has been the scene of sectarian hatred over the past year, defined by a 12-week loyalist protest against Catholic parents bringing their children to and from classes.

The Sinn Féin president Mr Gerry Adams said today he was shocked by the renewed violence and called on those involved to "draw back".

Speaking in Dublin this afternoon, he said the situation at Holy Cross school must be seen in the context of an orchestrated campaign of violence against Catholics in north Belfast by the UDA.

He alleged there had been over 300 attacks on Catholics in the last few months, for which no-one had been charged.

It was a "dangerous thing" to be a Catholic living in the area, Mr Adams added.