Residents fear more trouble as they are left to pick up pieces
SCORCHED roads and torn down fencing in the Sperrin Park area of Nelson Drive bear testament to yet another night of violence across loyalist areas of Londonderry.
A gang of around 50 youths gathered in the area on Monday night where a car and a digger were set on fire along with stolen wheelie bins and fencing as police officers came under attack from a hail of petrol bombs.
Anti-police and anti-northern Ireland Protocol graffiti has been sprawled across walls in Nelson Drive, Irish Street and Rossdowney areas of the Waterside where, for the past seven nights, PSNI officers have come under attack.
Motorists driving along the Limavady Road close to the entrance to Nelson Drive had stones thrown at their vehicles. They included Derry and Strabane Aontu councillor Emmet Doyle, who was in a local taxi.
He said: “Just as the taxi that we were in reached the junction to Nelson Drive there was an almighty smack and the wing mirror of the taxi was smashed to smithereens.
“The front passenger window was hit as well and I know that, had whatever hit the car struck a couple of inches further in, the windscreen would have been smashed.
“We realised immediately what had happened so obviously the taxi driver didn’t stop but he was badly shaken.”
While residents were too fearful to be identified, the majority of those who did speak to the Belfast Telegraph were concerned that their homes and cars would be destroyed if the violence continued.
One Nelson Drive man said: “What went on here on the streets was nothing but wanton thuggery.
“This has nothing to do with a funeral in Belfast nearly a year ago, and for the life of me I can’t see how burning cars and tearing down people’s fences is going to stop a united Ireland.
“I don’t suppose Boris Johnson is sitting in Downing Street saying, ‘they’re wrecking Northern Ireland, so I’d better scrap the Northern Ireland Protocol’.
“A lot of people living here don’t have very much but even the wee bit they have isn’t safe from being set on fire and that’s the sad thing.
“These young boys are hurting their own — not Sinn Fein, not the politicians — just the people in their own community.”
Meanwhile, across the River Foyle in the Galliagh area, police officers attending a bomb alert on the Templemore Road were also attacked by youths throwing petrol bombs in a incident unrelated to the loyalist violence.
Roads around the area were closed from shortly after 4pm on Monday afternoon while ATO examined a device which was later declared a hoax.
Chief Superintendent Darrin Jones, who has set up a specialist unit to examine CCTV footage of the violence over the past week, appealed for community leaders on both sides of the river to help halt the disorder.
He said: “We saw further disorder in our city during which our officers came under attack again.
“Again, we saw disgraceful scenes during which cars were set on fire and property damaged.
“This is reckless and criminal behaviour, and it has to stop. It is absolutely appalling and achieves nothing except harm to our community.
“We do believe there is a level of orchestration behind this where young people are being sent onto the streets who are going to end up hurt or with criminal record.”