Sinn Féin has hit out at the Orange Order after the organization blamed the "MTV generation" for more rioting in East Belfast.
Trouble broke out near the interface with the Catholic Short Strand district on Friday of last week following an Orange Order parade. The previous week the area saw some of the worst sectarian rioting in East Belfast for ten years when loyalists attacked the Short Strand.
On Friday night, six police officers were injured as missiles were thrown and vehicles were damaged following a "mini twelfth" parade.
Officers fired plastic bullets and used a water cannon to disperse the crowd. Seven people have been arrested for riotous or disorderly behavior.
Sinn Féin Assembly member Alex Maskey has described attempts by the Orange Order to blame MTV for drunken violence after the parades as further evidence of an "organization unwilling to accept responsibility for its actions."
"For years the Orange Order has repeatedly ignored serious violent and anti-social behavior which is directly connected to a number of its parades," he said. "When it comes to disorder and illegality at Orange parades it is never the fault of the order.
"Over the years, variously nationalists, the police, the Parades Commission and the weather have been blamed for drunken bandsmen, Orangemen and hangers on. Bizarrely, today, MTV has been added to the list. It is high time the Orange Order lived up to it's responsibilities. They should recognize how a number of their parades are offensive to host communities where they insist on marching through.
"It is time they stopped blaming everyone else for events surrounding their parades and instead take action to see illegal and anti-social behaviour stopped."
Chief Inspector Mark McEwan said the parade itself had passed off peacefully.
"There were a number of minor incidents, one assault in particular seemed to be the catalyst for more intense, spontaneous disorder. The disorder was not orchestrated," he said.
Jim Wilson, a loyalist community worker, said it was hard to convince some youths that disorderly behavior was "not productive."
"When you get big crowds it's harder to manage, and sometimes when people have drink in them the sensibility goes out the window," he said.
"You try to talk to young lads who would reason with you in a normal state, but when they get a bit inebriated you become the devil and they become right in everything that they do."
Tensions remain high in the area as well as the Crumlin Road in North Belfast ahead of next week's Twelfth of July parades.
