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A judge has warned that anybody present at a riot will be remanded in custody, even if they were only a “curious observer”. District Judge Francis Rafferty said that someone’s presence at a riot made them involved in the riot as he refused two bail applications. The judge spoke as four men appeared in Belfast magistrates’ court charged in relation to disorder in the city. Cameron Armstrong, 18, from Belfast, was charged with rioting in the Connswater area of east Belfast, which saw “violent disorder, petrol bombs, fireworks and different projectiles thrown at police and extensive damage caused to property”,...

"It's not easy to stay here—more for my life and my safety; I can't try over and over again with the same result." Mohammed Idris, who owns Bash café, in south Belfast, says he will not reopen after his business was set alight during violent protests. Disorder broke out after an anti-immigration protest in the city on Saturday. Mr Idris has told BBC News NI his businesses have been targeted before, saying his shop on Sandy Row was targeted last year. "My computer shop was completely damaged just like this café. This café was a hope, a place for a...

Police are treating 'Irish lives matter' graffiti which has appeared in west Belfast as a 'hate incident' The graffiti appeared after signage saying the community "will no longer accept the re-housing of illegal immigrants" was erected in the Suffolk area on Tuesday. The West Belfast MLA Gerry Carroll said there was no place for this "racist poison". While Sinn Féin MP Paul Maskey described it as an "attempt to create fear and intimidate people". Inspector Andrew Matson said: “We are treating the matter as a hate incident. “Our local Neighbourhood Policing Team have been undertaking enquiries in the area and...

VIDEOJoe Biden in Belfast strongly hinted that he is descended from Robin Hood of Nottingham. Not a joke! Perhaps next week Elizabeth Warren will claim to be descended from Montezuma.

A security scare shadowed President Biden’s trip to Northern Island on Wednesday after a top-secret document containing the itinerary for his visit to Belfast and information about his protective detail was found in the street. A passerby discovered the police paper, which detailed where the president was staying in Northern Ireland as well as the phone numbers of the Police Service of Northern Ireland officers in his security detail, BBC Radio Ulster reported.

American President Joe Biden, accompanied by his son Hunter and his sister Valerie, touched down at a military base outside Belfast on Tuesday evening as he prepares for a four-day tour of Nothern Ireland and the neighbouring Republic of Ireland to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Peace agreement. Mr Biden was met on the tarmac by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak after arriving in the country at around 9 pm local time at the Royal Air Force base in Aldergrove in County Antrim near Belfast.

I am watching the show... I have watched some of the movies nominated for Best Picture...BELFAST...DUNE...WEST SIDE STORY... NO TIME TO DIE song was nominated...I want to see if that Bond song wins Oscars... BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS...Won by Ariana Debose...WEST SIDE STORY...She was fine in the movie...

Northern Ireland’s health minister is suing Van Morrison after the singer called him “very dangerous” for his handling of coronavirus restrictions. The Belfast-born singer opposes restrictions to curb the spread of the virus, and has released several songs criticizing lockdowns. He denounced Northern Ireland Health Minister Robin Swann during a gathering at Belfast’s Europa Hotel in June after a Morrison concert was canceled at the last minute because of virus restrictions. The defamation suit relates to three incidents in which Morrison criticized Swann, calling him “a fraud” and “very dangerous.” …

Northern Ireland police faced a barrage of petrol bombs and rocks on Thursday, an AFP journalist said, as violence once again flared in Belfast despite pleas for calm. Riot police on the republican side of the divided city were pelted with projectiles as they tried to prevent a crowd moving towards pro-UK unionists. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Irish counterpart Micheal Martin had earlier called for “calm” following days of violence that included a petrol-bomb attack on a moving bus. Martin and Johnson held telephone talks in which they stressed that “violence is unacceptable” and “called for calm”, the...

Masked loyalists are seen after hijacking and setting a car on fire at the Cloughfern roundabout in Newtownabbey, Belfast, Northern Ireland, Saturday, April 3, 2021. Masked men threw petrol bombs and hijacked cars in the Loyalist area North of Belfast. Loyalists and unionists are angry about post-Brexit trading arrangements which they claim have created barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK. (Peter Morrison/PA via AP) The disturbances followed unrest Friday and Saturday in unionist areas in and around Belfast and Londonderry, also known as Derry, that saw cars set on fire and projectiles and gasoline bombs hurled...

Hillary Clinton has been appointed as the new chancellor of Queen’s University Belfast, the college announced on Thursday. The former US first lady, secretary of state and senator, who has been a regular visitor to Northern Ireland going back to the first visit of President Bill Clinton in 1995, becomes the university’s first female chancellor. Ms Clinton, who failed in her bid to be elected US president, holds an honorary doctorate from Queen’s. She will serve as chancellor for a five-year term.

News broke on Thursday morning that the Pantsuit Princess has accepted a post as the new Chancellor at Queen’s University in Belfast, Northern Ireland: Emerald Robinson ✝️ ✔ @EmeraldRobinson Hillary Clinton is going to be the head of a university in Northern Ireland? That's an interesting choice. Discuss.https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-50970400 … Hillary Clinton Hillary Clinton is new chancellor of NI university The former US presidential candidate takes up five-year role with Queen's University, Belfast. bbc.com 241 9:29 AM - Jan 2, 2020 Twitter Ads info and privacy 315 people are talking about this The post is largely ceremonial, according to the BBC,...

Hillary Clinton is to be the new chancellor of Queen's University, Belfast (QUB). She is the university's 11th chancellor and first woman to take up the post. In a statement, Mrs Clinton said it was a "great privilege" to become the chancellor of QUB. She takes up her role immediately and will serve for a period of five years. Mrs Clinton succeeds Dr Tom Moran - who died last year. While the role of chancellor is mainly a ceremonial one, securing Mrs Clinton will be seen as a coup for Queen's. The chancellor often presides at graduation ceremonies and is...

A case involving a Belfast bakery, that refused to make a cake with a pro-same-sex marriage slogan for a customer, has been referred to the European Court of Human Rights. Ashers Baking was found guilty of discrimination in 2015 for refusing to make a cake for Gareth Lee. Mr. Lee requested a cake with the words “Support Gay Marriage” iced on top, but the owners of the bakery refused due to their Christian beliefs. The bakery has said its objection was to the message on the cake, not the customer. Mr. Lee’s legal bid in Europe’s highest court will argue...

Zookeepers say a group of chimpanzees used branches weakened by a storm to make a ladder and escape from their enclosure at the Belfast Zoo. Video filmed Saturday by visitors to the Northern Ireland zoo showed several primates scaling a wall and perching atop it, with one walking down a path outside the enclosure. Zookeeper Alyn Cairns said trees in the chimps’ enclosure had been weakened by recent storms, allowing the animals to break them and fashion a ladder to escape.

In the shifting narratives of the Trump-Russia probe, a Maltese academic named Joseph Mifsud has remained a linchpin regarding claims of collusion. He is the professor who allegedly told Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos that the Russians had emails related to the Clinton campaign. The FBI says it opened its investigation in late July 2016 after Papadopoulos relayed that information to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, and the Australians tipped off U.S. authorities. While some news accounts describe Mifsud as an accomplice to Russian clandestine operations or a “cut-out” (intermediary), others contend he is a full-fledged Russian spy. In an official...

All or nothing at all -- three-quarters of a country never appealed to him, nor did the idea of a political entity called Northern Ireland that was created in 1920, comprising the six northeastern counties of Ireland in the province of Ulster. Gerry Adams is still adamant about the need for a united Ireland. As a political entity, the Republic of Ireland, first called the Irish Free State, was created in 1922. On November 18, 2017 the 69-year-old Adams, president since 1983 of Sinn Fein, the left-wing political party, announced that it was time for a change and that he...

ABC News is reporting that Current and former CIA officers speaking to ABC News on the condition of confidentiality say the United States scrambled to get all the suspects off European soil before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived there today. The officers say 11 top al Qaeda suspects have now been moved to a new CIA facility in the North African desert. The disgrunted intelligence officers even disclosed an actual list of 12 high-value targets allegedly held by the CIA, and ABC is reporting it : Abu Zubaydah: Held first in Thailand then Poland Ibn Al-Shaykh al-Libi: Held in...

A bakery in Northern Ireland owned by evangelical Christians has lost an appeal to overturn a conviction that found it guilty of discrimination for refusing to bake a pro-gay-marriage themed cake. The court of appeal in Belfast on Monday upheld a previous judgment last year that Ashers Bakery had discriminated against a customer on the grounds of sexual orientation. The family-owned firm in the original case was also ordered to pay £500 compensation to the local gay rights activist Gareth Lee, whose legal action was backed by the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland. Lee had tried to buy a cake...

The city of Belfast in Northern Ireland is gearing up for its annual gay pride parade this weekend. But what are the challenges that face LGBT people living in Northern Ireland where sexual identity and politics always seem to clash. Peter Coulter has been to meet a transgender woman living in Belfast, who would like to rejoin the Orange Order.