Ace Worldwide News Group 17:20 on 30/05/2014
Tags: #AceBreakingNews ( 348 ), #ANS2014 ( 3,575 ), Londonderry, Northern Ireland ( 5 ), Protestant

` Northern Ireland Hotel Damaged in Bomb Attack No Casualties Reported '

#AceBreakingNews – NORTHERN IRELAND (Londonderry) – May 30 – A Northern Ireland hotel was damaged in a bombing late on Thursday that politicians said was an attempt to drag the province back to its bloody past, but there were no injuries.

(Irish Times) – The device was thrown into the reception of the Everglades Hotel in the Prehen area of Derry by a masked man last night.

A 1998 peace deal largely ended three decades of violence in Northern Ireland between Protestants who want to remain British and Catholics favouring unification with Ireland, but pockets of division and sporadic violence remain. A device packed into a holdall bag started a fire after it was thrown into the reception of the luxury Everglades Hotel in Londonderry. Staff managed to evacuate the hotel before the device exploded, “undoubtedly preventing a tragedy”, a Northern Ireland police spokesman said.

The bomb went off while disposal experts were trying to defuse it. It was the first attack in Northern Ireland since the bombing of a shopping mall in November and there was no immediate claim of responsibility or explanation of why the hotel was targeted.

“So many people are working hard to move the city forward, but those behind this device are trying to drag us back to the worst times,” local member of parliament Mark Durkan of the republican SDLP party said in a statement.

Northern Ireland deputy first minister Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein, once a leading figure in the Irish Republican Army (IRA), condemned the attack and said his home-town of Londonderry would not be held back by those living in the past.

In the past two weeks, police in the Irish Republic have seized two substantial bombs and made a series of arrests before the devices could be shipped across the border into Northern Ireland for use.

The hotel attack came hours after a new Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland was appointed.

BBC News – Irish Times

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#londonderry, #northern-ireland, #protestant

Ace Worldwide News Group 21:17 on 01/04/2014
Tags: #AceWorldNews ( 2,984 ), #ANS2014 ( 3,575 ), #Syrian ( 72 ), al-Nursa Front ( 14 ), Al-Qaeda ( 119 ), Alawite ( 3 ), Armenian, Catholic ( 6 ), Islam ( 35 ), Jihadist's ( 25 ), Kassab, Latakia ( 8 ), Orthodox ( 5 ), President Bashar Assad ( 16 ), Protestant, Shiite ( 30 ), Syria ( 392 ), Turkey ( 93 ), UN Security Council ( 28 )

` Russian Foreign Ministry says that the `UN Security Council ' must discuss Alleged Attack by Al-Qaeda on Kessab'

#AceWorldNews – SYRIA – April 01 – The situation in Syria’s Christian majority town of Kassab, which was reportedly attacked by Al-Qaeda-linked militants, must be discussed at the UN Security Council, the Russian Foreign Ministry says.

“The UN Security Council should discuss the situation in Kassab and give it a principled evaluation,” it stated.

On March 21, Jihadists reportedly crossed into Syria from Turkey and seized the town in Latakia province, home to over 2,000 ethnic Armenians.

The attack caused hundreds of local families, mainly Armenian, to flee their homes and seek shelter in the city of Latakia.

SYRIA – April 30 – (TS) – Rebels seized control of Kassab on Sunday after launching an attack two days earlier in the coastal Syrian province of Latakia. The fighters were from an array of conservative and Islamic groups, including the Al Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front.

The province has an ancient Armenian presence, but is better known as a bastion of support for President Bashar Assad. It is his ancestral home and that of followers of the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, that he belongs to.

The clashes led most of Kassab’s estimated 2,000 residents to flee some 57 kilometres to Latakia city, emptying out a village that boasted a Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant church.

“We had to flee only with our clothes. We could not take anything, not even the most precious thing — a handful of soil from Kassab. We could not take our memories,” said a woman to Syrian state television. She identified herself as Kassab resident, but did not give her name.

Middle Eastern News

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#syrian, #al-nursa-front, #al-qaeda, #alawite, #armenian, #catholic, #islam, #jihadists, #kassab, #latakia, #orthodox, #president-bashar-assad, #protestant, #shiite, #syria, #turkey, #un-security-council