Two days later the tricolour was again displayed and the RUC smashed their way into the building with pickaxes to remove it. The removal was the signal for the worst rioting in Belfast for thirty years. Petrol bombs began making their appearance as the RUC deployed armoured cars and water cannons. Next night, Friday, the RUC ‘pacified’ the Falls. Hundreds of helmeted police backed up by armoured cars drove protestors off the streets and some fifty of them into hospital. The tension spread to Dublin where a crowd marched on the British Embassy and stoned the Gardai. In Belfast, Nationalist
...more
