Scottish Greens co-leader Ross Greer has branded protesters who took to the streets in Scotland and Belfast following the north Belfast stabbing attack as “scumbags.”
Violence erupted in Belfast on Tuesday night, with a bus and several homes set on fire, while protesters also gathered in multiple parts of Scotland including Glasgow’s Buchanan Street, with some invoking the memory of murdered 18-year-old Henry Nowak, reports Breaking News.
Speaking on BBC Radio Scotland, Greer condemned the scenes: “Those were racist rioters. If you are burning the houses down of people who are not white, you’re a racist rioter, you’re a criminal — you are a scumbag.”
He added: “From what I heard from people in Glasgow yesterday, you had grown men walking down Buchanan Street screaming at anyone who wasn’t white, including children who were not white, screaming at them, ‘send them home’. So scumbag would be the word that I would use to describe them as well,” reports Breaking News.
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Mr Greer said he “really feels for” the family of Henry Nowak, who had repeatedly called for calm following the sentencing of their son’s murderer.
“Henry Nowak’s family have said over and over and over again that they do not want that tragedy, they do not want his murder to be used to stir up this kind of hatred, and his family are being constantly ignored by these people who are taking advantage of this situation,” he said, reports Breaking News.
He compared the situation to the case of Alina Burns — a neo-Nazi obsessed teenager who attempted to behead a Kurdish man — saying there had been “absolute silence” from those marching when that incident occurred.
“Why is it they’re willing to get together, put their face masks on, march down the street and intimidate non-white people in this country? It’s not because they want this country to be a safer place — they don’t want it to be a safer place. These are racists — there’s nothing complicated about this,” reports Breaking News.
Scottish First Minister John Swinney said the scenes in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Ayr were “unacceptable,” stating that “racism, hatred and intimidation have no place in Scotland,” while Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said violence and disorder “only serve to divide our communities,” reports Breaking News.
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