An SDLP MLA in Larne, Co Antrim, has said he would not be driven from his home after it was again attacked by loyalists at the weekend. The house Mr Danny O'Connor shares with his parents at Churchill Road has been the target of numerous attacks.
Early on Saturday a brick was thrown at the house, smashing a bullet-proof window. Nobody was injured.
Mr O'Connor vowed to stand as a candidate in the election despite the intimidation. "These people are not only intimidating my family and myself but they are trying to intimidate nationalist people who may be standing for council election . . .
"These thugs and bully boys must not be allowed to succeed in their attempt to undermine democracy and drive people out of Larne." The Ulster Unionist MP for the area, Mr Roy Beggs, who visited Mr O'Connor, described the attack as "inexcusable and unjustified". He "unreservedly" condemned the incident. Meanwhile, a couple and their three children escaped injury in a pipe-bomb attack on their home in the lower Shankill in west Belfast early yesterday. The family was asleep when a device was pushed through the letterbox, damaging the front door and hall area. In Ballysillan in north Belfast, at least five shots were fired at the house of a married couple, smashing the living-room window.
Neither attack is believed to have been sectarian.
In the Turf Lodge in Belfast, petrol was poured into the porch of a house at about 5 a.m. yesterday, but was not ignited. In Derry, a man was burnt on his arm and stomach in a petrol-bomb attack. The device was hurled into his flat on Nelson Drive just after 4 a.m. yesterday. His clothes caught fire as he tried to extinguish the flames.