Police praise after town parade

Protesters played Lambeg drums at police lines in Ballymena

Police have praised those with influence in the loyalist and republican communities for helping avert trouble at a Ballymena parade.

Several hundred loyalists staged a protest over the first republican parade in the County Antrim town.

Protesters dispersed peacefully after a stand off with police in riot gear.

The Parades Commission had restricted the march, held to commemorate the introduction of internment in 1971, to the nationalist Fisherwick estate.

Some stones were later thrown at the junction of Suffolk and Sommerfield Streets in the town, but no-one was injured.

Superintendent Terry Shevlin said the event passed off as well as he could have hoped.

He said police had been in communication with representatives from both communities to ensure trouble was avoided.

"I am generally content in the way the policing operation went," he said.

Loyalists played Lambeg drums, a feature of Orange parades, for several minutes in a protest at the march.

The march involved two republican bands from Antrim, a town about 11 miles from Ballymena, parading the length of Fisherwick Gardens.

Community relations

Parade organiser Paddy Murray, a republican from Antrim, said it had been organised to avoid youngsters marking internment with bonfires.

Mr Murray said that despite many residents being opposed to the march, some people in the area wanted it to take place.

"There are people here who want it, but there are also others that don't, so it is about trying to find a happy medium," he said.

SDLP assembly member for North Antrim Sean Farren said he believed the parade was bad for community relations.

"I am not complaining or criticising the manner in which the parade was organised," he said.

"I am questioning the very wisdom of having such a parade in the town at this time."

Sinn Fein councillor Monica Digney said she was "totally opposed" to the parade taking place and criticised the Parades Commission for giving the march the go-ahead.

"I was here in a capacity where residents had asked me to come in to monitor the parade," she said.

DUP assembly member Mervyn Storey said the parade had been "organised for confrontation".

He said: "This was not a tradition which was normal in Ballymena, there was a tradition being created here by republicans to heighten tension and that is something we will continue to oppose."

Meanwhile, police have condemned an overnight paint attack on a Roman Catholic church in Ballymena.

Police said it was linked to tensions in the town arising from Tuesday's parade.

It is the third time the church has been attacked in the last month.

The Parades Commission was set up in 1997 to make decisions on whether or not restrictions should be imposed on controversial parades during Northern Ireland's marching season.