Protesters torch buildings, cars over Belfast stabbing
Anti-immigration protesters torched buildings and vehicles in Belfast on Tuesday evening and blocked roads, a day after a stabbing allegedly by a Sudanese refugee, captured in a graphic video that shocked the country.
Hundreds of protesters, many masked, gathered at several locations across Belfast, AFP journalists saw. A bus and several cars were set alight, while a building fringing the city center caught fire and its residents had to be evacuated.
Sky Television showed other buildings on fire.
Police helicopters patrolled above the city and shops were also closed early.
Michelle O’Neill, the First Minister of Northern Ireland, slammed the protests and urged calm.
“Groups of masked men burning families out of their homes is nothing less than disgusting cowardice,” she said on X (formerly Twitter).
“Racism, intimidation and violence are wrong wherever they occur. There can be no excuse and no justification for these attacks tonight. No one wants to see this on our streets and I again appeal for calm.”
Crowds also gathered in Antrim, around 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of Belfast.
US tech billionaire Elon Musk had earlier retweeted a post by anti-immigration activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon—also known as Tommy Robinson—adding: “Only by protesting REPEATEDLY and LOUDLY will there be any change!!”
Suspect charged
The suspect in the knife attack, whose name has not been released, was charged on late Tuesday with attempted murder, possession of a bladed weapon in a public place and making threats to kill. The 30-year-old man is due to appear in court on Wednesday.
As anti-immigration figures, including Reform Party leader Nigel Farage and Restore Britain leader Rupert Lowe, demanded details about the attacker, the interior ministry confirmed he was a Sudanese refugee with a residence permit valid until 2028.
Northern Ireland Police Chief Jon Boutcher said he had arrived in the United Kingdom in 2023 via Paris and Dublin.
Tensions were already high in Britain after violent skirmishes last week in Southampton, southern England, over the police handling of the murder of a young white student stabbed to death by a British Sikh man.
On Tuesday, dozens of demonstrators also gathered there outside a hotel housing asylum seekers, carrying banners reading “no racism, just patriotism” and “enough is enough.”
The video from Belfast shows a man straddling another man lying in a street and slashing him several times in the head and neck with a knife, in what far-right figures claimed was an attempted beheading.
Hot-button issue
Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the incident “horrific” and “sickening” on X.
The leaders of Northern Ireland’s five main political parties issued a joint statement condemning the incident, saying “there is no place in our society for this kind of brutality.”
Immigration has become a hot-button issue in Britain and helped fuel the rise of the hard-right Reform UK party in the polls.
