Wednesday, June 17, 2009

More Than Meets The Eye?

Does anyone else think that something seems a little bit odd here:

Around 20 families were helped by police to evacuate their homes in the Lisburn Road area of south Belfast and seek safety on Tuesday night.
115 people, 20 families decide in unison to seek sanctuary. That seems somewhat over the top, there have been flare ups of racial violence in other cities over the years but have never culminated in the mass exodus of one community, even in situations where more severe violence has occurred.

I don't want to impugn the motives of the victims here but I get the strong impression that there is something that isn't being reported whether that is what is the background to the tensions or whether any paramilitary groups are involved.

8 comments:

James Higham said...

It does seem a bit strange, a bit overactive.

JuliaM said...

I wasn't aware NI even had a big migrant population...

On the 'Jeremy Vine Show' this afternoon, although most callers were supportive of the families and condemned the violence, one caller did emphasise that there had been a lot of begging on trains and in shopping centres associated with these families.

Another caller remarked on Martin McGuinness's soundbite that the families had been terrorised: 'Well, he would know!'

sobers said...

I heard Martin McGuinness on my radio today as well, and nearly threw it out of the window. What sort of world have we become where a man with the blood of others on his hands can be interviewed by the BBC on the issue of violence and intimidation, and his history is totally ignored? Truely we do live in an Orwellian society. Truth is what those in power want it to be.

Matthew said...

What sort of thing would you mean? I can imagine that a N.Irish mob is probably more violent and harder to deal with than one in Preston, surely?

Mark said...

Yes there is more to this than the anodyne reports on the BBC.
The evictees are Roma gypsies, not ethnic Romanians- the earlier reports over here completely fudged this fact- why ?
There is an interesting post about this story over at Slugger O'Toole- and the comments thread is very revealing, and well spiced with salty Irish wit.

JuliaM said...

There's a post on CiF too now.

Strangely, the poster doesn't mention the Roma connection at all. Good thing not all the comments correcting her have been moderated out.

Yet...

Matthew said...

The comments are funny.

"Stealing all our money, sitting on the dole, bringing criminal rackets to Belfast ... that lists some of the traits of members of Loyalist terror groups of course"

Ross said...

"I can imagine that a N.Irish mob is probably more violent and harder to deal with than one in Preston, surely?".

Yeah, but when you see some of the stuff Romanian gypsies have put up with in Italy recently without running for sanctuary the reaction in Belfast seems very extreme.

"The evictees are Roma gypsies, not ethnic Romanians".

I heard that, although I can see why they ocused on the 'Romanian' part of their identity, because N Ireland has had plenty of it's own travellers for centuries.