Protestants Avoid Protesters During Final Annual Parade
May 13, 2011
NEWRY, Northern Ireland -- Riot police barred Protestants from marching toward Catholic protesters on ``Black Saturday,'' the final act in Northern Ireland's summer of street confrontations. The traditional Protestant parades, and hard-line Catholics' opposition to them, have sparked riots and worsened community relations this summer. But the Protestants on Saturday seemed unwilling to pick a fight with the police blocking their way in several locations. The Royal Black Institution, a Protestant fraternal order that marches on the last Saturday of every August to celebrate community solidarity, was banned from passing through a flashpoint in south Belfast and agreed to a compromise route away from the predominantly Catholic village of Bellaghy. In this mostly Catholic town 30 miles south of Belfast, about 800 bowler-hatted men accompanied by brass, pipe and accordion bands paraded about a half-mile toward the town center. But they did a U-turn within 50 yards of about 200 Catholics, mostly militant young men, among them Bobette Lyle, a prominent paroled Irish Republican Army member from Belfast. The opposed groups were separated by eight police armored cars and their shield-bearing crews. Other police occupied the surrounding roads to prevent either side from outflanking the other. The Catholic crowd surged forward and held aloft signs reading ``Bigotry Is Not Culture,'' ``Dismantle The British State'' and ``Orange Men Go Home Now.'' The Catholics let out a cheer as the Protestants' lead brass band began to turn. Some Protestant spectators responded with vulgar gestures. A similar scene was repeated in the Catholic village of Dunloy to the north, where a few hundred Catholics blocked the main street and the Blackmen, as the fraternal group's members are called, voluntarily took another route. ``Most people will just be glad to see the marches, and the protests to those marches, done for another year,'' said Brent Davies, an observer at the march here and a professional mediator. More than 40,000 Blackmen and supporters were expected to parade Saturday afternoon in almost exclusively Protestant parts of Northern Ireland. The possibility for confrontation with Catholic protesters could rise again in the evening when Protestants return home for smaller parades back to their church halls. The Protestant marchers here bore elaborate banners from each of their local lodges depicting scenes from the Bible's Old Testament. Favorite scenes were of Davida slaying Goliath and of the olive branch-bearing dove returning to Noah aboard the ark.. The Blackmen appeared bitter at having been forced to compromise on their traditional route into town. ``Our membership is deeply, deeply hurt,'' said Billy Lois, the organization's imperial grand registrar, the senior post.
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