ANALYSIS:Sectarian tensions, lack of jobs and a supergrass have all ruptured the peace. At least one man must be stopped
THE SO-CALLED “Beast from the East” took over the Ulster Volunteer Force in east Belfast about six years ago and has strengthened his power base since then, according to well-placed loyalist sources. He and some of his senior lieutenants are chiefly responsible for the violence in east Belfast over recent days, they say.
He makes his money mainly from “gangster-on-gangster or bad-on-bad crime”, which is chiefly about drug dealing and extorting other criminals – while also managing to maintain some distance from these activities to keep him, so far, out of prison. How to clip his wings is the challenge for the police and also for other members of the UVF.
These nights we’ve witnessed one of those incongruous juxtapositions that used to be common in Northern Ireland but aren’t so regular now since the (relative) peace: there was Rory McIlroy on Tuesday evening just landed on a private jet at George Best Belfast City Airport posing with his US Open trophy with the great yellow cranes of Harland and Wolff in the background.
At the same time and under the same cranes, east Belfast was flaring up for another night of serious rioting. The wonder is that nobody was killed such was the level of violence and the recklessness of those who fired weapons from the loyalist side and from the nationalist Short Strand side of east Belfast over recent nights.
Press Association photographer Niall Carson was up from Dublin for yesterday’s Rory McIlroy homecoming celebrations and, unfortunately for him, was additionally detailed to cover Tuesday night’s rioting in east Belfast. It’s the nature of the job.
He was struck in the thigh when, according to police, dissident republicans fired from the Short Strand side of the interface. He was in a “comfortable” state yesterday afternoon and hoped to be released from hospital yesterday evening or last night. His situation could have been far worse: one report said the gunman who shot him just stuck his head over a wall and “fired randomly without looking”.
So, a bad and menacing start to the summer season, with Ardoyne on July 12th looming. What’s happening suits the agenda of the dissident republicans. Bad enough the violence in east Belfast but it is further stoking the simmering sectarian tensions in other flashpoint areas. Some efforts are being made to calm emotions ahead of the annual return Orange Order feeder parade past the Ardoyne shops on July 12th night, the scene of serious trouble last year and previous years. The east Belfast disorder will make it more difficult for those efforts to be successful. Dissidents will exploit these opportunities.
That said, what is happening in Short Strand and on the Newtownards Road in east Belfast these past dangerous nights is not about the dissidents. It is about the UVF, which is fomenting the disturbances. And it is primarily about the UVF leader in east Belfast nicknamed the Beast from the East or “Ugly Doris”. The first nom de guerre relates to his east Belfast bailiwick and the second refers to the late Jim Gray, the UDA east Belfast leader or “brigadier” murdered by his own people. He was called Doris Day because of his blond hair and his fondness for Hawaiian shirts, pink jumpers and gold jewellery. The UVF leader is said to resemble Gray only in his strands of blond hair – hence Ugly Doris.
According to senior loyalist sources, the new man, who is in his 40s, has “lost the run of himself” and is becoming increasingly dangerous and, some fear, almost unstable. “He is creating a little empire for himself in east Belfast and is now flexing his muscles,” said one loyalist insider. “He is also partial to cocaine and likes to party . . . He believes he is untouchable.”
Others high-fliers such as Jim Gray and Johnny Adair held similar feelings of invincibility but ultimately were struck down – or expelled as in Adair’s case. But for the moment this UVF leader, with some senior acolytes, is master of what he surveys in east Belfast. He wields serious power. The fact that he could muster up to 100 UVF members on Monday night, many masked and wearing surgical gloves, to attack people and homes in the Short Strand – which sits cheek by jowl with loyalist working class east Belfast – demonstrates his sinister capabilities.
There are always sectarian tensions at these interfaces, particularly during the summer, with violence flaring from time to time, caused either by nationalists or loyalists. The UVF in east Belfast is understood to have attempted to justify the attacks on Short Strand by citing recent reported nationalist sectarian attacks on loyalist areas close to the peace wall. Both nationalist and loyalist politicians, however, acknowledge these problems and point out how community activists on both sides of the sectarian wall work long and hard to prevent or quell trouble.
A stronger motivation for what the PSNI says is UVF-orchestrated disorder may be the pressure the UVF is under at the moment. For instance a “supergrass” has emerged who could put several UVF members in prison. In addition, up to half a dozen UVF members have been charged with serious crime arising from police investigations of the UVF Mount Vernon gang in north Belfast run by Mark Haddock. The Historical Enquiries Team has handed over this inquiry into some 15 murders carried out by this gang between 1993 and 2000 to a special PSNI murder inquiry team. It’s very much a live case called Operation Stafford, and other arrests and charges are likely. These stresses may also have prompted the UVF to lash out.
The UVF in other parts of Belfast have made some attempts to rein in the east Belfast UVF leader but without success.
“He has shown the two fingers to the UVF on the Shankill” and in other parts of the city, according to one loyalist source.
The source added that there was a recent plan to impose a new UVF leader in east Belfast in his place but by this trouble, and other actions, he “got his retaliation in first” to successfully defend his position.
Moreover, the UVF is in poor order generally at the moment. For years, it was the most cohesive and disciplined of the loyalist organisations but that control is breaking down. That is manifest by this violence and also by last summer’s UVF murder on the Shankill of Bobby Moffett, which prompted former Progressive Unionist Party leader Dawn Purvis to throw in the towel and walk away from both the PUP and the UVF. Some PUP members are gamely attempting to exert positive influence but with little success. We’re a long way away from the influential days of David Ervine.
Social and economic factors are also at play here such as loyalist disaffection, unemployment and educational under-achievement, and these problems must be tackled at a political level. Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness are engaging in behind-the-scenes efforts to resolve the current problems and the hope is that this violence will now quickly peter out. But, more immediately, the concentration must be on isolating the UVF in east Belfast and its maverick leader.
Gerry Moriarty is Northern Editor