Britain rules truce over in Northern Ireland
(AP)
Updated: 2005-09-14 07:43

Police arrested 63 suspected rioters, more than half of whom have already been charged with crimes ranging from hijacking to attempted murder. On Tuesday, in the most high-profile case, a 34-year-old man was arraigned on charges of possessing seven firearms, pipe-bomb equipment and a balaclava mask.

The UDA, in hopes of avoiding any punitive sanctions from Britain, announced Tuesday afternoon its estimated 3,000 members would "avoid any confrontation on the streets and steer away from any acts of violence." It conceded that the rioting had only damaged their own impoverished Protestant power bases.

The smaller, usually better-disciplined UVF remained silent — apparently resigned to Britain's negative cease-fire ruling.

British recognition of an outlawed group's truce brings both symbolic and practical benefits.

The public representatives of truce-observing groups are entitled to a place in negotiations, while those deemed not on cease-fire are barred. Also, convicted members of groups with British-recognized truces received early prison paroles as part of the 1998 peace deal — and UVF parolees now could find themselves being thrown back behind bars.

A man walks past a burnt out bus in a Loyalist area of North Belfast, northern Ireland, September 13, 2005. [Reuters]

Hain was expected to discuss the fallout at a Belfast news conference later Wednesday.

Speaking before Hain's announcement, the most prominent UVF-linked politician in Northern Ireland, David Ervine, said he didn't know whether a British rejection of the UVF cease-fire would make matters worse or better.

"It could have a positive effect, or it could stir passions further. It could have no effect at all," said Ervine, a veteran UVF bomb-maker who today leads the UVF's legal Progressive Unionist Party. "The only important thing now is to get over these awful, awful days and restore people's confidence as quickly as possible in the cease-fire."

Belfast street tensions resumed Tuesday night as small Protestant crowds blocked several roads, snarling rush-hour traffic for the second straight night. Police said all the protests, while intimidating to motorists, remained nonviolent and eventually dispersed without riots.

However, after dark Protestants again sporadically tossed gasoline-filled Molotov cocktails at the police's foot patrols, armored vehicles and security bases in Belfast and the suburb of Lisburn, where one officer suffered minor burns.

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