Call to community leaders

Attacks on police by nationalists followed parade

Community leaders are being urged to help calm tensions in Northern Ireland in the run-up to the summer marching season after weekend nationalist rioting and a dissident republican bomb attack.

Security Minister Adam Ingram made the call after a riot in Portadown, County Armagh, where 57 Royal Ulster Constabulary officers were hurt in "vicious" clashes with nationalists, following a loyalist parade on Saturday afternoon.

Mr Ingram said: "A mob that attacks with paving stones, petrol and acid bombs is not engaged in anything that can be remotely called legitimate protest."

Community leaders and all those of influence must work together to take Northern Ireland forward

Adam Ingram

On Sunday, the police and civilians escaped injury in an abortive rocket attack on the RUC station in Strabane, County Tyrone.

The improvised rocket launcher, containing a device with 1lb of Semtex, misfired.

Rocket launcher abandoned

The dissidents abandoned the loaded launcher in Barrack Street in a residential area.

A dozen homes were evacuated for more than five hours as a security clearance operation took place.

The police blamed the attack on the Real IRA, which bombed Omagh in 1998, killing 29 people.

The same organisation is believed to have been behind two other attempts to bomb security bases in Northern Ireland over the past fortnight, as part of a pre-election campaign.

Adam Ingram: "We must work together"

Mr Ingram said: "The events in Portadown and Strabane again highlight the difficult and dangerous job that the police are required to do to maintain the rule of law in Northern Ireland.

"Once again the police have borne the brunt of that mob violence and over 50 officers have been injured as a consequence."

He added: "As we move into the summer, community leaders and all those of influence must work together to take Northern Ireland forward."

Officer hospitalised

The disturbances in Portadown flared after the Parkmore Junior Orange march passed the bottom of the mainly nationalist Garvaghy Road and as police and troops were withdrawing, according to the RUC.

Catapults were used to pelt missiles at security forces and there was hand-to-hand fighting between rioters and the security forces.

Some of the injured suffered broken bones and one officer was detained in hospital on Sunday.

Nationalist politicians criticised the use of plastic bullets to quell the disturbances.

Brid Rodgers, SDLP assembly member for Upper Bann, which includes Portadown, and a minister in the Northern Ireland Executive, said she was raising the subject with the Irish government.

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams said he had spoken to both the Dublin and British governments about the handling of the trouble.

Mr Adams said: "Plastic bullets are lethal, deadly weapons and they should be withdrawn from use immediately.

"The speed with which the RUC is prepared to use them reinforces the need to replace that paramilitary force with a genuine new beginning to policing."