Teens charged after Belfast loyalist riots

The teens were arrested during rioting on Friday and Saturday over the decision to remove the Union Flag from the city hall for all but 17 days a year.

About 2,000 people demonstrated relatively peacefully in Belfast city centre on Saturday, singing sectarian songs, burning the Irish tricolour and rounding off the hour-long demonstration with a rendition of God Save the Queen.

Former National Front and BNP member Jim Dowson was among the speakers at the rally.

Mr Dowson - now fundraiser for the English Democrats - later handed out leaflets calling on protesters to "smash the Alliance Party."

The non-sectarian party's six councillors sided with republicans to push through the flag vote.

Three of the councillors have had their homes vandalised, a constituency office in Co Antrim was destroyed in an arson attack and the party's only MP Naomi Long has received a death threat.

There were pockets of violence on Saturday night after the rally in Newtownards Road in east Belfast and in the O'Neill Road area of Newtownabbey.

Police said some of the violence was being directed by loyalist paramilitaries.

Figures from both sides of the sectarian divide have condemned the violence and appealed for calm.

Retailers have warned that the unrest is seriously hitting business, with the rally leaving the city's Christmas market virtually empty on what is normally the busiest weekend of the year.