DUBLIN (Reuters) - Irish nationalists clashed with police in Dublin on Saturday as demonstrations against a planned march by Northern Irish Protestants exploded into the worst rioting in the city for more than a decade.
Hundreds of rioters hurled bricks, fireworks and bottles at police as they waited for the "Love Ulster" rally to start.
The rioters were protesting against plans for relatives of people killed by the Irish Republican Army (IRA), a guerrilla group that fought to unite Northern Ireland with the Irish Republic, to march through central Dublin with pro-British musical bands.
Organizers abandoned the rally before it got under way as riots spread to other parts of the city center.
Police shepherded bewildered shoppers and tourists off Dublin's main shopping streets and said 14 people, including six police officers, were taken to hospital. They made 37 arrests.
Roads were sealed off and shops shut across the city center.
Rioters hurled metal fences into the road and setting bins alight on O'Connell Street, one of the city's busiest shopping thoroughfares.
The street was the scene of the 1916 Easter Rising, a rebellion against British rule in Ireland that helped to bring about the country's independence.
WINDOWS SMASHED
An elderly woman told Reuters windows were smashed in an exclusive department store close to the Irish parliament, where some of the "Love Ulster" Organizers had gone to meet the country's Justice Minister after the march was abandoned.
"They smashed the windows in with iron bars. It was terrible," the woman said. "They (the shop staff) were shouting at everyone to get down and everyone got on their knees." Cars in front of the shop were set alight.
Justice Minister Michael McDowell condemned the violence, which began at around midday but which had subsided by evening.
"The only message these people have managed to convey to the people of Dublin and of Ireland is that sectarian violence is, once again, being unleashed against all of the principles of the Good Friday Agreement and the overwhelming wishes of the Irish people," he said.
Northern Ireland's 1998 Good Friday peace deal largely brought an end to three decades of sectarian conflict in the British-ruled province, although deep mistrust still divides communities there.
Most of the majority Protestant population in Northern Ireland support continued British rule while the minority Catholic population tend to favor union with the predominantly Catholic south.
Saturday's abandoned rally was intended to call on the Irish government to do more to help investigate unsolved murders blamed on nationalist guerrillas.
Around 3,600 people were killed during the "troubles" of the 1970s, 80s and early 1990s. About half were killed by the IRA.
The IRA's political ally, Sinn Fein, which has politicians north and south of the border, condemned Saturday's violence.
"There is absolutely no justification for the disgraceful scenes which occurred in the city center this afternoon," said Sean Crowe, member of parliament for Dublin South West.
It was the worst rioting in Dublin for at least 10 years. In February 1995, police arrested 45 people, mostly English soccer fans, after fighting broke out in Lansdowne Road stadium, south of the city center, at a match between England and Ireland.
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