LINDA STOUFFER, CNN ANCHOR: Overseas now and the growing tensions between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland. It is like rubbing salt in a 300-year-old festering wound. Around Belfast, pro-British Protestants are marking their annual Orange Order parades commemorating the 1690 military victory over Catholics. CNN's Nic Robertson is in Belfast with the latest on these parades, and they have become a flash point for violence. Good morning, Nic.</s>NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Linda. Well, behind me is a steel barricade that has been erected to stop those marchers coming into this Catholic neighborhood. The government body set up to re-route these marches away from Catholic neighborhood has told the Orange Order they cannot march through this area today. Now they are marching in 18 other locations across Northern Ireland. Tens of thousands of Orange Order marchers, and as you say, they commemorate a 1690 Battle of the Boyne victory of Protestant forces against Catholic forces. They see these marches as part of their tradition, as part of their heritage. But, in recent days, they have brought about violence to Northern Ireland because of contentious marchers. They want to go through Catholic neighborhoods. One march last weekend was due, they said, to go through the Catholic neighborhood of Portadown, and there last night 21 policemen were injured in clashes with rioters, petrol bombs were thrown, glass bombs were thrown at the police. In the northern city of Derry, at the other end of Northern Ireland, three more policemen were injured. The police responded with firing from water canon and also firing baton rounds, these are the large plastic bullets that they fire to use in crowd-control situations. This was the ninth night of continued violence throughout Northern Ireland and this violence is going on because of protests called by the Orange Order in support of their claims to march through these Catholic neighborhood today. A tense time in Belfast, a tense time across the whole of Northern Ireland, security forces at the ready for trouble -- Linda.</s>STOUFFER: Nic, thank you very much.
Orange Order Parades: Ninth Night of Continued Violence in Support of Claims to March Through Catholic Neighborhoods