David Sharrock, Ireland correspondent for The Times, explains the background to the weekend's riots and assesses the chance of peace in the long-divided province.

Who was fighting at the weekend, and why did it spread so rapidly?

The trigger for the weekend's violence was a parade by the Orange Order which had been diverted away from a Catholic section of the route in West Belfast. The Whiterock Parade should have taken place more than a month ago, but because of a ruling by the Parades Commission the Orange Order decided to put it off.

They chose to go this weekend, by which stage a lot of loyalist anger and bitterness had built up over what they perceived to be concessions to the republicans.

What concessions?

The release of Sean Kelly, convicted of killing ten Protestants in a bomb attack, on the eve of the IRA's July announcement that its campaign was over, increased the suspicion that republicans were being unfairly rewarded.

This is a very tit-for-tat society, and if one side is seen to be benefiting, the other immediately feels aggrieved. The announcement that the locally-raised battalions of the Royal Irish Regiment were to be disbanded also made the loyalists unhappy.

Added to this, the UVF (Ulster Volunteer Force) is involved in a feud with the LVF (Loyalist Volunteer Force) and as a result four people have been murdered this summer. There has always been rivalry between the various paramilitary groups even those ostensibly on the same side, but the UVF has finally decided it is going to close down the smaller, more hardline LVF.

What this all amounted to was the lid had coming off the Pandora's Box and many people looking for an excuse to vent their anger.

Is this an isolated burst of violence or is it a return to the "hideous dark past", as the Northern Ireland Secretary said today?

I doubt that this is a one-off. The history of this part of Ireland is one of sporadic rioting for the past two centuries. The character of that rioting is maintained because of the complex geography of Belfast, where Catholic and Protestant areas abut one another, creating flashpoints at their borders. Although Peter Hain might talk about the community putting this history behind them, it is extremely difficult to see how that would be achieved other than in the very long term.

Has Belfast changed since the Good Friday Agreement was signed?

One of the most bizarre things about Saturday night's violence was that at the same time in the centre of Belfast there was a huge BBC concert linking with others all around Europe for the Proms. The centre has been transformed in the past few years and is now buzzing with bars and restaurants, and yet a mile away there was this rioting with gun battles and bombs.

Much of the city has become very prosperous and would look normal to English eyes, yet there are still some areas where the kerb stones are all painted red, white and blue, there are huge murals on the walls and flags flying everywhere. These parts have actually become a selling point for the tourists - you can see, say, Italian visitors staring out of their tour bus windows gob-smacked that they still exist.

If the Government declared the loyalist ceasefire over, what would be the significance of that?

If the IRA had been found to have breached its ceasefire it would have been a simple matter of imposing sanctions against its political wing Sinn Fein as has happened in the past. The MPs have their facilities at Westminster withdrawn, grants are held back and so on.

Because there is no loyalist equivalent to Sinn Fein it is hard to see exactly what effective measures could be taken against them. The paramilitary groups have minor political representation.

What can the Government do next?

Mr Hain is suggesting a 'carrot and stick' approach. He was saying how the appalling the violence was, but at the same time he did acknowledge some of the grievances of the loyalist community saying that these people are rioting because they feel they have been short-changed and excluded by the peace process.

There may be some room for manoeuvre, perhaps finding some grant funding for the impoverished loyalist estates of West and North Belfast. As is so often the case in Northern Ireland, there will be announcements made in public and then, in the background, meetings and deals done in secret in an attempt to find a reasonable solution. However, there is no quick fix.

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