NI Conservatives’ co-chair, Trevor Ringland, has expressed dismay at a new paramilitary mural which is being painted in east Belfast.
“This mural, which features UVF gunmen, evokes a dark and murderous past, which the vast majority of people in the community want to leave behind”, Trevor said. “Yet again, it sends out an appalling message to the young people of east Belfast and it is another example of a paramilitary organisation attempting to celebrate and justify its campaign of violence and criminality. It is simply not acceptable in a Northern Ireland which is trying to move forward and offer a peaceful, hopeful future for generations to come.”
“As a society, we have to challenge those who want to glorify paramilitarism robustly. While the context in which violence took place drew in many who would not otherwise have broken the law, their campaigns brutalised and damaged their own communities and the whole of Northern Ireland. To counter continuing efforts to glorify and justify the acts of paramilitary organisations, an effort should be made to bring victims of their unlawful acts into schools, particularly in the areas where these celebrations occur, to explain the heartache, pain and damage which terror inflicted.”
“With the two new UVF murals in Belfast, the Brian Robinson parade, the republican celebration in Castlederg and an event to celebrate the Shankill bomber, Thomas Begley, and against a backdrop where there are still shootings and unlawful violence, a new challenge is needed. We simply mustn’t allow children to become infected with hatred or dragged into conflict with the law, by people who are still trying to justify a bloody, hopeless past.”