BELFAST, Ireland, March 15th 2009(AFP) — Gangs of youths threw petrol bombs at police in Northern Ireland on Saturday after a prominent republican was among three people arrested over the murder of two British soldiers.
The troubled province's police chief, meanwhile, warned that hundreds of dissidents, whom he described as "very dangerous", were aiming to derail its fledgling peace process.
The three men, aged 21, 32 and 41, were being questioned by police over the shooting of the soldiers at Massereene Barracks in Antrim, on March 7.
According to a police source, the 41-year-old was Colin Duffy, who has distanced himself from Republican party Sinn Fein since it agreed to share power with pro-London unionists.
In the aftermath of his arrest, gangs of masked youths threw stones at police near Duffy's home in Lurgan, and petrol bombs were later thrown at vehicles belonging to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), a police spokesman said.
"Missiles including petrol bombs and stones have been thrown at police at a number of locations in Lurgan," a PSNI spokesman said, adding that no one had been injured and no petrol bombs had been thrown since around 7:00 pm (1900 GMT).
The spokesman estimated that the youths had numbered around 20, and said that a male in his late teens was arrested but later released, while a male in his early teens had also been arrested.
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