Red Hand Defenders - Notable Attacks

Notable Attacks

The RHD emerged when it claimed responsibility for a blast bomb attack on 7 September 1998 during a loyalist protest in Portadown. The loyalists had been protesting against the decision to ban the Orange Order from marching through the town's mainly Irish Catholic and Irish nationalist quarter (see Drumcree conflict). The attack killed a Catholic Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officer. Since then, the RHD has claimed responsibility for killing a further ten people. Of the eleven people the RHD claimed to have killed, nine were civilians, one was a former UDA member and one was an RUC officer. The group admitted shooting to death a Catholic man, Brian Service, while he was walking home in North Belfast on 31 October 1998, and to an attack on a pub in West Belfast earlier that day. One of the RHD's most notable attacks was the assassination of human rights lawyer Rosemary Nelson on 15 March 1999. She had represented alleged Irish republican paramilitaries, the family of Robert Hamill, and the Garvaghy Road Residents Association. Nelson had been working with Prime Minister Tony Blair toward resolving the conflict in Northern Ireland. She had also testified in Washington, D.C. about the plight of attorneys who were subjected to harassment and threats for representing Irish nationalists. Nelson further informed that she and her family had received death threats. The killing of Nelson was a significant setback to the peace process due to a fear of the need for retaliation. Moreover, this killing was the first high-profile assassination since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. In August 2001, the RHD claimed responsibility for an attempted pipe-bomb attack on a Sinn Féin Member of Parliament and an attempted car bomb attack at a fair shortly thereafter where streets were filled with civilians, though both plots were thwarted by police. The RHD also claimed responsibility for the murder of a journalist named Martin O’Hagan in September 2001, who was shot to death while walking home from a pub with his wife. O’Hagan had previously been threatened by Ulster Volunteer Force brigadier Billy Wright, who became the leader of the LVF and was subsequently killed in the Maze Prison. The attack may have stemmed from the journalist’s report on alleged collusion between loyalist paramilitaries and security forces in Northern Ireland.

According to the U.S. Department of State, the RHD claimed responsibility for killing a total of five individuals in 2001. In 2002, the RHD claimed responsibility for the murders of a Catholic teenager and a Catholic postman (with the UDA and the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) also subsequently claiming responsibility for the attacks), and also bombed the home of a prison officer. On 16 January 2002, the RHD allegedly made a statement agreeing to "stand down" at the request of the UDA/UFF after threatening Catholic postal workers and teachers. The sincerity of the statement was immediately called into question. The RHD resumed its campaign a few months later with a nail-bomb attack on a well-known republican. The RHD successfully separated itself from the UDA in February 2003 with the murder of UDA member John Gregg, who had attempted to kill Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams almost 20 years before. The attack on Gregg may have stemmed from disapproval with the RHD that had been expressed by the UFF. The RHD is believed to have engaged in periodic bombings and shootings in 2003, and further claimed responsibility for an attack in September 2004.