EXCLUSIVE How Ballymena boiled over: After horrifying riots sparked by two Romanians being accused of raping teen, RICHARD KAY meets the victims - and locals furious at 'endless stream of migrants' they had no say over
By daylight, Ballymena, a town of 30,000 people in rural County Antrim, bustles with commerce and activity: farmers taking livestock to slaughter while pedestrians cheer on a peloton of cyclists on a training run up the Galgorm Road.
But as dusk falls, the bucolic mood is transformed into something rather more sinister. Marauding gangs of masked youths stalk the streets, barricades are set ablaze and the acrid smell of burning tyres fills the night air.
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