US observers criticise PSNI handling of loyalist marches

A group of US observers has criticised the PSNI for allowing known loyalist paramilitaries to parade through Catholic areas during last year's marching season in the North.

In a report on its observations, the New York-based Irish Parades Emergency Committee also called for the prosecution of marchers who deliberately displayed loyalist insignia in nationalist areas in breach of Parades Commission guidelines.

The committee said the Orange Order, the PSNI and the Parades Commission needed to take greater responsibility for systematic violations of the law at loyalist marches.

It also said that Ardoyne residents, mainly young people, attacked the police on July 12 and there could have been worse nationalist violence and even deaths but for the intervention of republican leaders.