After 2 nights of anti-immigration riots, the town of Northern Ireland is on the brink

The broken windows were covered in plywood on the Clonavon terrace in Ballymena on Wednesday afternoon, and the ends of the curtains blew lazily out of the windows. In another window, the fiber ends of the burnt bed frame are visible, which is a sign of arson attack.

For two nights, the street in Northern Ireland has been the site of riots, with what police called “hatred acts and mob rule”, and houses, businesses and vehicles being attacked. Some fear the upheaval will start over Wednesday night.

On Monday, two 14-year-old boys were charged with verbal rape on the Cronavin terrace on Saturday night, violent outbreaks broke out. The BBC reported that the boys spoke through Romanian translators and all denied their attorney allegations.

The attack sparked a strong protest from Ballymena, a town with about 31,000 people and has been involved in a wider anti-immigration campaign, which has led to several violent outbreaks in recent years. The far-right groups and influencers on social media expanded news about the attacks and celebrated the subsequent riots.

According to the latest census data, Northern Ireland has increased immigration in recent years, with the percentage of the population outside the UK rising from 6.5% in 2011 to 8.6% in 2021. However, compared with many other countries in Europe, the number of immigrants is still relatively small and the number of immigrants is high. Experts say far-right activists use housing shortages and ongoing living crises to incite violence against asylum seekers and other immigrants.

Police officers were injured on Tuesday night after being “continuous attacks” by Molotov cocktails, bricks and fireworks, according to a statement from the Northern Ireland Police Department.

A local politician, Sian Mulholland, who evacuated a pregnant woman from a house, told the BBC program “Good Morning” and added that the violence had been broadcast live on social media, while the rioters were targeting “how to tie around the police.”

The Cronavin Terrace and the surrounding streets were quiet Wednesday afternoon as residents crowded at the door. Some houses in the area have signs and flags showing the nationality of the people inside. “British Family,” a handwritten sign read a smashed window. United Jack and red and white Ulster flags hung from windows. At some doorways, signs with Filipino flags informed the bystanders: “The Philippines lives here.”

Northern Ireland's first minister Michelle O'Neill said in a statement Wednesday that “racists and denominational attacks on families” were “annoying and must be stopped immediately”. “No one feels the need to put stickers on the door now or at any time to avoid being identified by the targets in their race.”

Police used water cannons to attack crowds and plastic baton engines to fire in Ballymena, while turmoil also occurred in the towns of Belfast and Carrickfergus. In the evening, protests took place in the Belfast area as well as in Lisbon, Coleran and Newtown Abbey.

Family members of the victims of sexual assault on Saturday said they did not tolerate violence and, through a statement issued by Paul Frew, called on people to “serve the right way”, who represented the region covering the Ballymena of the Northern Ireland Congress.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer spoke in parliament on Wednesday, condemning the violence, saying police “have time to investigate the incident, rather than facing unconscious attacks when seeking to bring peace and ensure people are safe.”

Jon Boutcher, chief police officer who leads the Northern Ireland Police Department, said police are reviewing videotapes and other evidence to identify mobs, saying: “The act of hatred and mob rules do nothing to the structural split of our society.”

“The unconscious violence witnessed in Ballymena over the past two nights is worrying and totally unacceptable,” he added. “These criminal acts are not only life-threatening, but also risk the ongoing criminal justice process to support the truth, justice and protection that victims deserve.”

A report released last month by the Independent Human Rights Organization Judicial Committee analyzed seven anti-immigration protests, social media activities, street activism and riots, with riots in Northern Ireland since 2023. The authors of the report concluded that the racist and anti-immigrant narratives in the north were created in the narrative of northern Ireland, an unsettling pattern. On social media.

The report's author Dessie Donnelly told The New York Times that criminal encounters involving immigration have triggered some previous events, while others “have all the marks of a fictional story.”

“There is a deliberate strategy to build a narrative that illustrates the events that 'other' – the immigrant community – against the events that happened in the 'our' community,” he said. “Suddenly, a lot of crimes, such as sex crimes, attempts to kidnap children, are lying at the doorstep of the immigrants living in our community “other”. Whether these events are right or wrong does not seem to matter.”

Mr Donnelly, who works at the Belfast-based technical research group, said police and government statistics show that the “overwhelming majority” of sex crimes in Northern Ireland were committed from the country by white people in the country, but that extreme messaging immigration as a threat is to “find fertile ground.”

According to the latest census in Northern Ireland, 16% of residents of Balimana recorded a national identity in 2021 in countries outside the UK, Ireland and Northern Ireland groups, up from 10% of the last census in 2011.

In the recent census, the largest nationality among the “other” organizations is Romanian, followed by Polish, Bulgarian and Slovak.

Five people were arrested Tuesday night for alleged riots in Balimena, while another suspect was arrested on suspicion of crimes in Newtownabbey.

Police also investigated the Molotov cocktail attack in the village of Cullybackey, about three miles from Ballymena, which took place shortly after midnight on Tuesday.

A car caught fire and a woman and two children were damaged inside nearby, which investigators regarded as a racially motivated hate crime.