Martin Meehan targeted as loyalist attacks continue
BY LAURA FRIEL
Over 40 loyalist pipe bomb attacks in as many days and everyone
knows it is only a matter of time before someone else is killed.
Photographs of the fire-gutted home of a young Catholic family in
the New Lodge area of North Belfast after a loyalist pipe bomb
attack this week graphically illustrate the lethal potential of
this crude sectarian weapon.
Three young children, asleep in their beds at the time of the
attack, escaped the fate of the Quinn children of Ballymoney, who
cried as they were burnt alive in a similar loyalist attack on
their home in 1998, but it was luck rather than design that
spared the lives of these latest targets of loyalist terror.
d the attacks continue.
Around midnight on Sunday and a pipe bomb explosion had almost
wiped out an entire family when a fire caused by the explosion
engulfed their New Lodge home. Just 24 hours later another North
Belfast family, this time in Ardoyne, were forced to flee their
home after being targeted in another loyalist pipe bomb attack.
Two adults and three children aged from a year to 15 were
uninjured when a device discovered in a plant pot outside the
living room window failed to explode. The father of three
discovered the pipe bomb as he was preparing to drive his
children to school on Monday morning.
The attack took place several days after the man, a taxi driver,
was warned by the RUC that he was being targeted by loyalists.
The family said they would not be returning to their home.
On Tuesday night there were five separate loyalist attacks in the
North. In Larne, shots were fired through the kitchen window of
the home of a Catholic family living in the Seacourt estate.
Catholic families living in the estate have been repeatedly
targeted by loyalists over the last year and many have been force
to flee. The family targeted in this latest attack was the last
Catholic family living in the street.
A Catholic family living in the predominantly Protestant Fountain
estate of Derry City have left their home after being targeted by
loyalists in a pipe bomb attack. Around 1am, a device was thrown
at the home of a Catholic couple and three children in George
Street. The device partially exploded. The family were asleep in
the house at the time of the attack but escaped injury.
Sinn Féin Councillor Marion Hutcheon described the attack as
"another graphic indication of the ease with which loyalists can
carry out sectarian attacks with impunity."
A gun attack on a house in Bushmills on the same night is also
believed to be sectarian. This latest incident follows a number
of attacks on the homes of Catholics in the area. A man in his
40s was unhurt when shots were fired at hids Dunluce Road house.
Two more bullets were fired through the front door.
Meanwhile, a pipe bomb attack in Lurgan on the Tuesday is
believed to be part of the ongoing loyalist feud and a gun attack
in which one man was injured by broken glass in Castlerobin Road
in the predominantly Protestant Belvoir estate has also been
linked to loyalist feuding.
SEVEN ATTACKS ON MEEHANS IN 10 DAYS
Last week, North Belfast republican Martin Meehan was singled out
for further loyalist attack. In the last ten days, members of the
Meehan family have been attacked or threatened seven times.
In the early hours of 24 January shots were fired in to the home
of Meehan's eldest son, Martin Óg. Eight hours earlier the RUC
had warned the family of an imminent loyalist attack. Two bullets
were fired on hitting the chimney breast, the other lodged into
the front door. A few days later and the scenario was repeated
but this time Meehan's younger son Kevin was the loyalists'
target. On Sunday, four hours after the RUC had visited the home
of Kevin Meehan to warn him that his life was in serious danger,
loyalists launched a gun attack on the house. Three shots were
fired. The Red Hand Defenders, a cover name used by the UDA,
later claimed responsibility for the attack. Hours after the RUC
examined the scene of the attack Kevin found a bullet casing on
the stairs of the house. Martin Meehan senior said the RUC must
have picked it up outside and dropped it in the house.
Four days later and Martin senior was being actively targeted.
The RUC arrived at his Ardoyne home on Thursday to inform him
that loyalists were planning to assassinate him within 24 hours.
The RUC said the threat should be taken seriously. And, as is
their usual style, the RUC then departed, leaving the family to
take what precautions they could.
A few hours later, the RUC returned, claiming that loyalists had
telephoned a warning that two explosive devices had been planted
at the back of Meehan's house. No devices were found but a loaded
revolver, lying at the foot of a nearby wall, was discovered.
Initially, local people suspected that the weapon, rather than
dropped in a moment of panic, may have been deliberately left to
support a spurious claim by UDP spokesperson John White that the
ongoing attacks were not the work of the UDA but that republicans
were targeting themselves.
As one North Belfast resident recalled in 1969 when a "whole
street of Catholic were burnt out", unionist politicians also
suggested then that nationalists were burning their own homes.
"They're still attacking us and telling the same lies."
It was later revealed that the gun was a Webley .45 revolver and
contained two live rounds. The weapon has been linked to the
earlier shootings at the homes of Meehan's two sons, which have
been linked to the UDA.
Meanwhile, loyalists are being blamed for a pipe bomb attack on a
Catholic-owned bar in County Antrim. Customers at the Whitecliff
Inn, Whitehead escaped injury when a device failed to explode
after being thrown at the premises last Friday night, 2 February.
On Thursday, 1 February, Catholic families living in Ballynahinch
narrowly escaped injury when a pipe bomb was thrown through a
window in Loughside Drive. A second device exploded ten minutes
later.
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