Filipino families flee Northern Irish home

12/6/2025 6:15

Michael

Sancio, a resident of the Northern Irish town of Ballymena, said

he was woken at midnight on Tuesday by masked men banging loudly

on windows.



Sancio, his wife and daughter, and a couple who share their

house - all originally from the Philippines - grabbed their

passports and a few belongings and fled their home, sleeping at

a friend's house on Tuesday night. They said they plan to stay

further outside the town on Wednesday because they feel unsafe

at home.



Hundreds of masked rioters attacked police and set homes and

cars on fire in the town of 30,000 people for a second

successive night on Tuesday. Police are investigating the

damaging of property as racially-motivated "hate crimes".



"Last night I woke up at 12 midnight because I heard some

people outside, and I saw in the window, I saw the other guys

wearing a black jacket and black pants, and also they're wearing

a mask," Sancio, 27, told Reuters on Wednesday.



"They started banging the window of our neighbours so I

panicked because I have a daughter inside that house."



The rioters smashed the windows of the couple's car that was

parked outside the house and set it and a bin on fire, said

Sancio, who works at a local bus manufacturer.



The violence erupted after two 14-year-old boys were

arrested and appeared in court, accused of a serious sexual

assault on a teenage girl in Ballymena, a town with a relatively

large migrant population located 28 miles (45 km) from Belfast.



The charges were read via a Romanian interpreter to the

boys, the BBC reported, adding that the lawyer told the court

that they denied the charges.



Anti-migrant violence is rare in Northern Ireland, which for

decades has been more familiar with sectarian violence between

resident Catholics and Protestants, including in Ballymena.



While a 1998 peace deal largely ended the three decades of

bloodshed between Protestants who want to remain under British

rule and Catholics favouring a united Ireland, there are still

sporadic clashes.







'EXTREME FEAR'



Sancio said the masked men told them that they were not

targeting Filipino people.



Around Ballymena, Filipino residents put stickers of British

and Filipino flags on their doors, with messages saying

"Filipino lives here" to show they were not Romanian.



Union Jack flags regularly fly in the largely pro-British

town. Democratic Unionist Party councillor Lawrie Philpott told

Reuters that some people who usually don't fly flags had hung

Union Jacks outside their homes this week to show they are

local.



Around 6% of people in Northern Ireland were born abroad,

according to government statistics. The foreign-born population

in Ballymena is higher, in line with the UK average of 16%, and

includes a relatively large Filipino community.



Northern Ireland has been broadly welcoming to migrants but

that has been tested recently. Violent disorder erupted in

Belfast last August as part of anti-immigration protests that

swept across several UK cities following the murder of three

young girls in northwest England.



In the Republic of Ireland, rioting broke out in Dublin in

late 2023 during anti-immigrant protests that were triggered by

a stabbing attack that left a child seriously injured.



Sian Mulholland, a local lawmaker from the Alliance Party,

said she was fielding calls from migrant families who in some

cases had barricaded themselves into their homes until 0230 on

Wednesday morning.



"I had been engaging with this community beforehand because

the houses they are living in are not fit for purpose. They're

(living in) squalor," she told Reuters.



Sancio's wife, Mariel Lei Odi, was working a night shift on

Tuesday. When she returned home, she was worried about the

safety of their two-year-old daughter, she said.



"When I (came home to) my husband and chatted about what

happened last night: (I said) 'my daughter, my daughter, my

daughter. What happened?'," she said.



Michael Asuro, who lives in the house with his wife, Jessa

Sagarit, said he came to Northern Ireland just under two years

ago to seek a better life. Sagarit said she felt traumatised by

the events.



Police have said they are braced for more violence on

Wednesday.



As residents boarded up broken windows and doors in

Ballymena, the Filipino families wondered about their future and

whether they will stay.



"We feel extreme fear," Asuro said.