Students in Belfast will soon be under close surveillance after complaints from residents in the most popular area for student accommodation.

The "Holylands" area of Belfast lies behind Queens University and stretches as far as the Ormeau Road and river Lagan. The majority of students living away from home in the city will live here for some, most or all of their time at college.

Until recently, residents in the area were fairly welcoming of the college-goers, but in the last year or so this has changed.

Early this year, HURG (the unfortunate acronym standing for the Holylands University Residents Group) was set up in response to what it calls the most gratuitous antisocial behaviour on the part of some students.

As part of its campaign to draw attention to the situation and to gather evidence, the group has begun filming in secret locations around the area. Spokesman Mervyn Dinsmore says the behaviour only started around three years ago and includes vandalising cars and trees and shouting sectarian songs.

"If anyone says anything, they are threatened with the paramilitaries," he says. "Of course I don't take it seriously but if you are an elderly person you do."

Dinsmore says the trouble-makers are definitely students; the incidents mostly take place on weekdays in termtime. However, he adds, `we realise most students are as much victims of this as we are." The president of Queen's students' union, John McAuley, says the residents group should hold that thought: it has been guilty of "a certain amount of student bashing in the papers," he says. "They do have some grievances but they are shared by the vast majority of students in the area."

McAuley called for a more proactive response to the problems of the area - and pointed out that students from other colleges, such as the Belfast Institute of Further and Higher Education and UU Jordanstown, also live in the area. Professor Ann Tate, provost at Jordanstown, says she is aware of the situation and has met police and residents' groups. All complaints would be investigated in accordance with the college's disciplinary code, but to date only one complaint has been received and it is important this person be given a fair hearing, she says.

Professor Bob McCormac, pro-vice chancellor of Queen's, said it investigated every reported incident and found that in as many as half the cases, QUB students were not involved. The university has a disciplinary procedure if students bring its name into disrepute and recently reminded all students of this.