Flashpoint parades to take place

Ormeau march is opposed by nationalists

Security operations are expected to get under way ahead of two contentious parades in Belfast on Monday morning.

The Parades Commission has barred a loyal order Easter Monday parade from the nationalist lower Ormeau area of Belfast.

But a Protestant Apprentice Boys parade past a flashpoint area of north Belfast has been given the ahead.

Sinn Fein has described the march past the mainly republican Ardoyne area as provocative.

Serious rioting by republicans followed a loyal order parade past the Ardoyne shops area last July.

Gerard Rice: "Residents have welcomed the decision"

The Ormeau parade in south Belfast has been controversial for the last 10 years.

The Parades Commission ruled the march by the Apprentice Boys of Derry will not be allowed to cross the Ormeau Bridge from the upper part of the Ormeau Road into the mainly Catholic lower Ormeau area.

The commission said that in making its decision, it had paid particular attention to the fact that this year marked the 10th anniversary of the Sean Graham betting shop murders.

In February 1992, loyalist gunmen burst into the bookmaker's shop on the lower Ormeau Road and shot dead five people inside.

The Ulster Freedom Fighters claimed the attack was in retaliation for the IRA murder of eight Protestants at Teebane in County Tyrone.

The Parades Commission said it "frequently received representations about sensitive sites of memorials or tragic events and tries to take note of these".

Last year, the commission gave permission for the Apprentice Boys' Ormeau parade to go ahead along the contentious route, but it was called off because of the foot-and-mouth disease restrictions.

The parade had been barred from the area for the previous two years.

Tommy Cheevers of Apprentice Boys Belfast Walkers Club accused the Parades Commission of "inconsistency" over the decision.

Tommy Cheevers: "The commission has showed inconsistency"

He said: "The reaction of the club is obviously one of disappointment, given that we have a Parades Commission which says it will be accountable, transparent and consistent.

"They allowed us to go down the Ormeau Road last Easter Monday.

"We called that parade off because of the foot-and-mouth crisis and since then we haven't got down the road at all, so I don't see where the consistency is."

But spokesman for the nationalist lower Ormeau Concerned Community residents' group Gerard Rice, said people living in the area were "relieved that the Parades Commission has finally acknowledged the special sensitivities in the lower Ormeau arsing out of the violence of the last 30 years".

He added: "The message is clear. Parading is not an absolute right and in circumstances such as ours, rerouting is entirely reasonable and entirely proportionate to the issues at stake."

The Northern Ireland Parades Commission was set up in 1997 to make decisions on whether controversial parades should be restricted.