Bomb hurts 2 cops at Belfast school

BELFAST, Northern Ireland -- A bomb exploded outside the entrance to a Roman Catholic primary school Wednesday as schoolgirls faced shouting, stone-throwing Protestant protesters for a third day. Two police officers were injured in the blast. \n"When the bomb went off I was scared to turn round to look behind me. I thought the children and parents that were just behind me were dead," said Isabel McGrann, who had escorted her 7-year-old daughter, Emma. \nSome of the girls, students ages 4 to 11, screamed when they heard the explosion from a nearby street, and a police officer was knocked down after apparently taking the force of the blast in his legs. He and another officer were treated for shrapnel injuries, police said. A police dog also was hurt. \nNone of the girls were hurt, however, and they continued on to Holy Cross school under heavy police presence. \nThe Red Hand Defenders, an outlawed Protestant group that had threatened to attack Catholic parents and police officers, claimed responsibility for the bomb. \nPolice consider the group a cover name used by Ulster Defense Association members, who are supposed to be observing a cease-fire in support of Northern Ireland's 1998 peace accord. UDA flags fly from many posts and houses in the Protestant section of Ardoyne, the otherwise Catholic neighborhood where the school is located. \nThree men were later arrested in connection with the bomb blast, police said. \nAnne Tanney, the head teacher at the school, said some of the girls arrived in "a terrible state of panic." \n"I'm really horrified and disgusted that this kind of thing could happen to children. To think that someone would throw a blast bomb (homemade grenade) is unbelievable," Tanney said. \nThe situation seemed calmer Wednesday. Nearly a hundred girls, two-thirds of the student body, reportedly came to school, doubling the numbers from Tuesday. The number of protesters also appeared to have declined. \nThe Royal Ulster Constabulary said 41 officers and two soldiers were injured by rioters in the 24-hour period ending at 5 a.m. Wednesday, and that more than 250 gas bombs, nail bombs and homemade grenades had been detonated. \nProtestant protesters have said they would keep harassing the students until Catholics stopped attacking their own vulnerable homes, which stand beside the school. \nAssistant Chief Constable Alan McQuillan rejected complaints from local residents that heavy-handed police tactics had inflamed the situation. \n"What we had last night was mobs on both sides attempting to attack the homes of the other community with the police and the army standing between them. \n"Let's be quite clear: This is not an attack on us. We are incidental to them; they are simply trying to get at the other side," McQuillan said. \nGerry Kelly, a senior figure in the Sinn Fein party, said the bomb was directed at children. \n"It injured an RUC man but it's a miracle that more people and children were not injured. \n"Somebody sat down in a paramilitary organization last night and said the thing to do is to try to attack them with a blast bomb," said Kelly, who party is allied to the Irish Republican Army. "The protesters have to be asked is this what they want"