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Polish flags, campaign posters burned on bonfire in Belfast

“Racist intimidation” against substantial Polish minority

LAURA BRYN SISSON,

IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Sunday, July 22, 2012, 11:06 AM

Updated Monday, July 23, 2012, 9:47 AM

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41 Comments

Polish flags and campaign posters for Magdalena Wolska, a Polish Social Democratic and Labor Party candidate who stood for the Northern Irish Assembly in May 5’s election, were burned on bonfires in Belfast last week.

Both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have substantial numbers of Polish immigrants or descendants of immigrants, whom the burnings could have been intended to offend and scare.

The Polish Association for Northern Ireland called the flag burnings “racist intimidation” in an open letter.

“There is already a high level of hate-motivated incidents on members of the Polish community,” according to the association’s spokesman, Maciek Bator.

Bator said he worried the flag-burning could fuel more hate and race-related incidents against the Polish community.

Belfast city councillor Claire Hanna, also of SDLP, called the incidents a “symptom of the inability of a minority in Northern Ireland to accept difference,” the Times reported.

Nster.com

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41 Comments

15 - 41 | See all comments

seanomelb | Jul 27, 2012, 07:07 PM EDT

"Half of Irish youth unemployed" that includes youths from all ethnic backgrounds you ignorant bigoted fool.

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seanomelb | Jul 26, 2012, 08:39 PM EDT

"Teanga no Ghael" or to simplify it for you "language of the Gaels" is!! repeat after me "Gaelic".If you wish to use the Anglicised name "Irish" your welcome.Dear me we have lost our equilibrium well! you never had it anyway you ignorant fool.I love toying with idiots.

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WoundedKnee | Jul 26, 2012, 03:53 PM EDT

seanomel: The name of the language is IRISH, you idiot. And it's a language you don't know two words of. But I note that yet again you have chickened out of my challenge. Listen, you racist fool, I'll repeat it. Explain what was defective or deficient in the Irish people that made them deserve to be supplanted in their own homeland by foreigners. Explain that, you stupid idiot. I note that today's Irish Independent reports "Almost half of Ireland's young adults were out of work in April last year, new figures have revealed.". Half of Ireland's young people out of work in their own country, and foreigners taking the jobs on all sides, and racist garbage like you continue defending the capitalists' project of Mass Immigration. Makes me sick, you skunk.

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Kilsally | Jul 26, 2012, 11:18 AM EDT

pilib04 - Loyalist bonfires happen in the same locations every year on the 11th night - kids usually pile up and collect the combustables - nothing to do with the Orange Order. And I doubt they would want to because then they would have to comply with health and safety laws, get insurance, have marshalls, get the fire brigade to pass the safety etc etc. Councils have been trying to get communities (including Republicans who have bonfires with unionist flags on top) to move to `beacons` but it is very difficult as there isn`t usually a group of structure to work with and if there was then you have all the red tape mentioned above. TayandCake - actually both `sides`, usually teenagers who have imbibed alcohol steal each others flags from lampposts and such like for their respective bonfires

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seanomelb | Jul 26, 2012, 03:20 AM EDT

Sarah who? Hannity's pick for president.

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dingle999 | Jul 25, 2012, 07:55 PM EDT

seanomelb - Woundedbrain is probably a supporter of the Tea Party in Georgia. Praise the Lord we do not have the lunatics (in much numbers) here in Ireland.. WoundedKnee is very alike Sarah Palin.. Remember the story concerning Sarah visiting Ireland ? Her plane landed at Shannon Airport to refuel , alas Sarah never left the plane. Indeed they are very alike

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seanomelb | Jul 25, 2012, 07:26 PM EDT

How am I a racist? Your attempt at Gaelic is puerile and grammatically incorrect. Your use of the word supplanted is also misplaced and if you wish to have a dialogue on Irish history I'm happy to oblige,But I fear it would be all to much for your narrow brain to absorb.

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dingle999 | Jul 25, 2012, 04:05 PM EDT

"that they merited to be supplanted in their own homeland." WTF WoundedBrain ... I ask the question again do you like the Asians living in Georgia USA ?

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WoundedKnee | Jul 25, 2012, 03:22 PM EDT

seanomel: You've been publishing garbage here for years. In all that time you haven't told us what was so defective or deficient in the Irish people that they merited to be supplanted in their own homeland. Until you explain this, I'll continue characterizing you as a worthless piece of racist garbage.

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dingle999 | Jul 25, 2012, 01:44 AM EDT

WoundedBrain do you like the Asians living in Georgia USA ?

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seanomelb | Jul 24, 2012, 08:45 PM EDT

WoundedKnee is not a bigot he hates everybody. I hope he's barred from owning a firearm.He cannot talk straight and most probably cannot shoot straight.I'm glad he's a balanced individual he drools down both sides of his mouth at the same time.LOL

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WoundedKnee | Jul 24, 2012, 05:06 PM EDT

dingle wants us to believe that you can't be a liar if you live in Ireland. How about a fool, dingle, is it possible to live in Ireland and be a fool? I guess you prove that rule!

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WoundedKnee | Jul 24, 2012, 05:04 PM EDT

Scrivner, unlike you I am not a bigot, so I am not going to start attacking Poland or Poles. I'm sure most Poles are fine people (excluding the large numbers in prison for crime in Ireland). They're just very right-wing. Lech whathisname was the only labor "leader" I ever heard of who argued in favour of the bosses and against the workers. Anyway, you haven't identified why Poles are superior to Irish people, so mjuch so that they are a "blessing". Don't hijack religious terms such as "blessing" to disguise what a disgusting little racist you are. Why should Irish people abandon their own ancient homeland in order to facilitate its settlement by huge numbers of Poles? What's the population of Poland? Maybe 40 million? That's ten times the number of Irish in the 26 Counties. Racists like you want the Irish to be levered out of their own country and replaced by foreigners. And by the way, learn a little US history. Look up Wounded Knee before you make stupid efforts to misquote it, you bigoted fool.

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dingle999 | Jul 24, 2012, 04:15 PM EDT

WoundedKnee Calling me a liar and I LIVE in Ireland and you live (wait a minute) in Georgia USA and yes please read this "Georgia had the second fastest growing Asian population growth in the U.S. from 1990 to 2000" . So WoundedBrain are Asians invading Georgia ? BTW the Irish American population is very small there it is 9.5% Irish... Get real

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Scrivner | Jul 24, 2012, 03:07 PM EDT

Hey WoundedKneeCap, allow me to add "winning Nobel Prizes and making great inventions." do you recall Lech, who opened the crack in Soviet communism to the benefit of all who love freedom? Would youi say that Chopin was more than a good piano player? How about conributing to the understanding of the universe, like Copernicus? A bit of the industriousness, that Polish immigrants are know for, are a blessing to the society they adopt.

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