{"id":633733,"date":"2026-06-11T20:56:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T20:56:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/633733\/"},"modified":"2026-06-11T20:56:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T20:56:14","slug":"minister-condemns-racist-thuggery-as-violence-returns-to-northern-ireland-protests-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/633733\/","title":{"rendered":"Minister condemns \u2018racist thuggery\u2019 as violence returns to Northern Ireland | Protests News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The return of unrest to the province, which suffered decades of sectarian violence before a peace deal was agreed in the 1990s, has provoked deep concern.<\/p>\n

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Published On 11 Jun 202611 Jun 2026<\/p>\n

The United Kingdom\u2019s minister for Northern Ireland has condemned the return of mob violence to the province as \u201cracist thuggery\u201d.<\/p>\n

Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Hilary Benn on Thursday slammed the previous two days of anti-immigration violence<\/a> in the capital, Belfast. The return of unrest to the province, which suffered decades of sectarian violence before a peace deal was reached in the 1990s, has provoked deep concern.<\/p>\n

Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n

Benn appeared relieved to report that the disorder on the streets of Belfast had lessened on Wednesday night compared with Tuesday. However, the racial nature of the mobs that clashed with police remained clear as they sought to get to a hotel previously targeted for housing asylum seekers.<\/p>\n

The street violence sparked by Monday\u2019s brutal stabbing<\/a> carried out by a Somalian man granted asylum has not only heightened far-right-provoked tension in the UK over immigration, but has also brought back memories of \u201cthe Troubles\u201d.<\/p>\n

Over three decades, Catholic Irish nationalists and Protestant pro-British \u201cloyalists\u201d waged a violent war, rending Northern Irish society. With all sides wearied by the conflict, it was brought to an end by the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, in which the British and Irish governments, as well as most of Northern Ireland\u2019s political parties, agreed on how Northern Ireland should be governed.<\/p>\n

Asked during an appearance on Sky News if the violent scenes witnessed were racist riots rather than protests, Benn said, \u201cWell, if you are targeting people on the basis of the colour of their skin, how else can you describe them? That is racist thuggery.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benn condemned \u201cthe sense of fear that has been created\u201d, reporting that police had arrested 16 people on Wednesday night. Police and politicians say much of the violence had been encouraged and coordinated online.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we have seen is significant coordination from online social media activity. Some from people within Northern Ireland and some from \u2026 outside the island of Ireland,\u201d Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson told reporters, adding that there may be prosecutions related to social media posts.<\/p>\n

Sudanese national Hadi Alodid has been remanded in custody by Belfast magistrates and charged with attempted murder. The case, which is not being treated as \u201cterrorism\u201d, has been adjourned to July 8.<\/p>\n

The condition of the victim, Stephen Ogilvie, was \u201cimproving\u201d on Thursday, the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Gavin Robinson, said after meeting his family.<\/p>\n

Ogilvie\u2019s relatives have appealed for calm in the wake of the \u201cterrible tragedy\u201d, saying violence was \u201cnot welcome\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The return of unrest to the province, which suffered decades of sectarian violence before a peace deal was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":633734,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[924,591,59,57,58,821,50,3283,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-633733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-crime","tag-europe","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-migration","tag-news","tag-protests","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=633733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/633734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}