The family of a Northern Irish man who lost an eye in a knife attack has appealed for calm after the incident triggered a wave of anti-immigrant violence in Belfast, with masked men burning homes and torching vehicles.
The appeal came as a Sudanese man appeared in court charged with attempted murder, and as British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and politicians in Northern Ireland condemned the violence targeted at ethnic minorities.
Police clashed with protesters for a second night on Wednesday, local time, deploying water cannons and armoured vehicles against a few dozen young men hurling bricks and fireworks to the north of Belfast.
But there was far less unrest than at the same time the previous evening after the video of the knife attack went viral.
Stabbing victim's family calls for calmThe family of the victim, Stephen Ogilvie, issued a statement calling for calm.
"We want to make it absolutely clear that overnight unrest is not welcome, and peaceful protest is the only way forward," the statement said.
"We have many migrants who make a deeply valuable contribution to our country … We do not want this terrible tragedy to be used to divide people or fuel hostility."
Speaking in parliament in London, Sir Keir said the attack raised serious questions but that "driving people out of their homes is not … the right way to respond".
The suspect in the attack, a 30-year-old Sudanese national named as Hadi Alodid, appeared in court on Wednesday and was remanded in custody.
Mr Ogilvie, who was in his 40s, suffered significant injuries to his face and back, the court heard.
Protesters set cars and homes alightVideos of the attack had circulated online all day on Tuesday, sparking calls on social media for violent protest.
Police had to help one family escape from a burning house. Several cars and a bus were set on fire and reduced to shells. Local politicians and a pastor said many of those targeted were black.Resident Jamie Corry, 33, said he could only watch on as his house went up in flames.
"I was actually standing right there watching my whole house just go up, slowly but surely," he said.
"I told them and all, when they were lighting a car up on fire, 'That's my property, that's my property,' … and they still didn't care."Following the posts from Mr Musk, as well as calls from anti-immigrant activist Tommy Robinson and others for more protests on Wednesday, Northern Ireland's police chief said an extra 200 officers were being deployed on the streets.
"These idiots didn't just target ethnic minority groups … they targeted society," Chief Constable Jon Boutcher said of Tuesday night's rioters.
Minister accuses 'bad-faith actors' of exploiting attacksSpeaking with 7.30's Sarah Ferguson, Northern Ireland's Justice Minister Naomi Long paid tribute to members of the local community who had come to Mr Ogilvie's aid during the knife attack.
But she said there was no doubt "bad-faith actors" who would have previously struggled to find the province on a map had sought to weaponise people's fear and anger over the incident to target innocent migrants.
"Last night in my own constituency, we saw infrastructure burned, we saw young families being driven from their homes, based on nothing but the colour of their skin,"
she said.
"They were not related to the individual who did this; they were not involved in any criminality, but unfortunately, they are now victims of crime themselves.
"That is not in anyone's interest.
"We need to pull together, we need to work through what is a very difficult time, but we need to put community first … so that everybody, whether they were born here or whether they've chosen to live here, can be safe in their home and safe on the street."The disorder in Northern Ireland is the latest violence to flare in the UK in response to a crime believed to involve a migrant, which has led to the calls for demonstrations from prominent anti-Islam and anti-immigrant activists.
Immigration has historically been low in Northern Ireland due in part to the three-decade conflict waged between mainly Catholic Irish nationalists seeking Irish unity and predominantly Protestant pro-British "loyalists" wanting to stay in the United Kingdom, and the British military.According to the 2021 census, 96.6 per cent of those living in Northern Ireland were white.
However, migration has increased in recent years, and there has been a hardening sentiment against it in both Northern Ireland and parts of the Republic of Ireland, with police statistics showing the number of racist incidents reached a record level in 2025.
University of Liverpool politics professor Jonathan Tonge told the ABC that anti-immigrant sentiment was present among both Protestant-unionist British and Catholic-nationalist Irish; however, the riots almost exclusively involved members of the former community.It should be said that the vast bulk of that Protestant-unionist British community would completely reject the violence … but there's a section of that community that simply won't listen to [appeals from Mr Ogilvie's family]," he said.
"Sixty years ago it was Catholics that were being attacked and burnt out of their homes … a couple of generations on and it's been immigrants."
Professor Tonge said reports that a "hit list" of migrants' homes had been circulated among the rioters were a "very sinister development".
"The family [of Mr Ogilvie] has been very brave in speaking out quite clearly and saying violence achieves nothing — and violence doesn't achieve anything," he said.
Source: abc.net.au
