The KKK flag in East Belfast
A Ku Klux Klan flag has been removed after being flown from a lamppost off Island Steet in East Belfast
The flag was erected on a lamppost on Island Street in Ballymacarrett on Tuesday morning, but has since been condemned after widespread outrage by East Belfast residents.
The hanging of the white supremacist flag comes after a spate of race hate attacks in East Belfast recently.
Alliance MP for the area Naomi Long told reporters: “To use flags hailing a hate group such as the KKK is sickening and lends a further menacing element to recent events.
“Yet again we see those who wish to bully anyone different from them use flags and emblems to assert dominance and control over a community. To do so at all is to be condemned, but to put up these flags in broad daylight shows just how brazen the culprits are."
East Belfast MLA Robin Newton said that the flag "does not represent the people of East Belfast, loyalists and particularly of all those people who today remember the sacrifice of those men who laid down their lives at the Battle of the Somme.
"It is vital that those thugs who have engaged in racist attacks, and who want to send out such a threatening and aggressive message to people from an ethnic minority background are identified and face the full weight of the law."
Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness also tweeted about the incident.
