Violence has broken out between police and protesters in Northern Ireland where properties have been damaged and missiles have been thrown at officers.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) said 15 officers were injured after they came under “sustained attack” from masked rioters, who threw petrol bombs, fireworks, heavy masonry and bricks.

Two police vehicles were damaged during the disorder in Ballymena, Co Antrim, while homes and businesses had doors and windows smashed, according to police.

PSNI said four houses were damaged with fire, with three people evacuated, and the incidents are being investigated as “racially-motivated hate attacks”.

At a press conference later on Tuesday, Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson said “this was racist thuggery, plain and simply”.

The assistant chief constable said the attacks in Ballymena should be “loudly condemned by all right thinking people,” adding: “I want to condemn these attacks in the strongest possible terms.”

“Any attempt to justify or explain it as something else is misplaced,” he said. “I cannot imagine the fear felt by those innocent families… I understand their fear.”

A 29-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of riotous and disorderly behaviour, attempted criminal damage and resisting police. Mr Henderson added that “there will be more [arrests] to follow”.

Local MP Jim Allister said tensions over immigration had been building for some time, adding that the violence followed a peaceful protest in support of the family of a girl who was the victim of an alleged sexual assault at the weekend.

Two 14-year-old boys were charged with attempted rape and were remanded in custody when they appeared at Coleraine Magistrates’ Court on Monday. The charges were read to them by a Romanian interpreter.

Mr Henderson said there was no intelligence suggesting the disorder was orchestrated, but added that some at the protest were “clearly intent on violence” and had prepared petrol bombs and masonry to use as missiles.

Justice Minister Naomi Long said: “I am absolutely appalled by the disturbing scenes in Ballymena yesterday evening during which PSNI officers were injured, residents terrorised, and properties damaged.

“There is absolutely no place in our society for such disorder and there can be no justification for it.”

Police condemned the disorder, which followed an initially peaceful vigil before people wearing masks broke away and started to build barricades, stockpile missiles and attack properties.

Local media estimated around 2,500 protesters were involved in the disturbances, which some dubbed “anti-immigrant”.

A Romanian mother of three, who lives in one of the targeted houses, said she is scared to stay in the area and her children were asking why they were being attacked.

Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson called for calm over the coming days and said: “Last night saw significant sustained disorder in Ballymena.

“This violence was clearly racially motivated and targeted at our minority ethnic community and police.

“I want to condemn these attacks in the strongest possible terms. It has no place in our society and should be loudly condemned by all right-thinking people.”

The prime minister’s official spokesman also called the disorder in Ballymena “very concerning”, and added: “Obviously, the reports of sexual assault in the area are extremely distressing, but there is no justification for attacks on police officers while they continue to protect local communities.

“PSNI and the justice system must be allowed to carry out their jobs and our thoughts are with the victims of the assault as well as the police officers who were injured.”

Videos of the incident on social media showed a large police presence, with officers in riot gear taking shelter behind a police Land Rover as a fire burned close by.

In other footage, protesters burned plastic road barriers and bins as part of a barricade on the street and masked individuals threw missiles including cans of paint and glass bottles at PSNI vehicles.

A line of police vehicles advanced towards the protesters followed by officers on foot.

Firefighters later responded to the burning debris on the road and inspected a nearby house which had filled with smoke.

Video also appeared to show some protesters targeting houses by smashing windows.

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Pictures of the disorder included one of a boat overturned outside a row of houses which appeared to have been those attacked by a mob.

Police said officers are also investigating reports a petrol bomb was thrown at a vehicle in the Tobar Park area of Cullybackey in the early hours of Tuesday, which is also being dealt with as a racially-motivated hate crime.

For years nuclear was a dirty word. Now, the tide is turning.

For the past 20 years or so, global nuclear power has stagnated amid concerns about its environmental damage and its safety after the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters.

Another nail in its coffin appeared to be its appalling record of delays and spiralling costs, while wind and solar plummeted in price and soared in supply.

But leaders are warming up to nuclear power again, driven by a few key trends.

Read more: Govt commits £14.2bn to new nuclear power station

First and foremost, they are anxious to keep pace with booming demand for low-carbon energy, driven by an explosion of data centres and the switch to electric cars and heat pumps.

Datacentres for AI and cloud computing not only have a voracious appetite for energy, but as they operate 24/7, they need a steady, reliable stream. Enter: nuclear, which can provide this most of the time.

The ‘flat pack’ power plant

Secondly, a new type of nuclear power plant may finally be on the horizon.

The much vaunted small modular reactors (SMRs) promise to be much faster and cheaper to build than something like Hinkley Point, because the parts can be built in a factory and assembled on site – the flat pack furniture of nuclear power.

They have long been celebrated but have failed to scale up. So far they exist only in Russia and China.

Nevertheless, industry and political leaders in other countries are confident their own SMR designs are almost ready to go, and the government on Tuesday said it wants Rolls-Royce to get the UK’s first SMRs online “in the 2030s”. That’s most likely another 10 years from now, so a mid-term solution, with much more clean power is needed in the meantime.

It also announced £14bn for Sizewell C, continuing plans for a nuclear revival started by the Tories.

Beyond the UK, leaders in the US, Canada, South Korea and France and even Japan – which suffered the 2011 Fukushima disaster – and Germany – which famously detests nuclear – are warming up to it again.

And so are businesses – last year Google became the first company to sign an agreement to buy nuclear energy from Kairos Power’s SMRs to power its data centres. Just last week Meta did the same with Constellation Energy.

As for traditional big plants, some are now being built on time and on budget, such as Barakah in the UAE. The South Korean company behind it is in talks to build the same type in the UK.

Safety concerns switch from disaster to climate

Thirdly, countries are trying to get off fossil fuels to fend off worse climate change. Nuclear power is very low carbon, and it is also safer than many fear.

Death rates from air pollution and accidents are lower from nuclear power than from any energy form other than solar power, research by data scientists at Oxford University’s Our World in Data project suggest.

Nuclear power also has the lowest greenhouse gas emissions of any energy form over its lifespan, and cancer rates from accidents can be mitigated by robust responses, the scientists said.

The undeniable price tag

That’s not to say nuclear does no damage, and the government’s announcement on Tuesday glossed over what it will do with the radioactive waste.

Sizewell C has been very unpopular with some local campaign groups that protest its local damage to trees, birds and coastline, and they recently launched a fresh legal challenge to additional flood barriers.

Traditional large reactors like Sizewell have also been eye-wateringly expensive and slow to build, and must be routinely taken offline for maintenance.

Critics argue that solar and wind power, backed up by batteries, are faster, cheaper and safer. Others want the money to be spent on reducing demand for power in the first place by insulating homes.

But societies and leaders are slowly becoming less concerned about nuclear disasters and other environmental impacts, and much more worried about climate change and reliable energy supplies – as crystallised by the 2022 energy crisis and recent mass power outage in Spain and Portugal.

Police have released video footage of the alleged killer of a 14-year-old boy unboxing a samurai sword and calling the weapon “freaking sexy”.

Marcus Monzo, 37, denies murdering teenager Daniel Anjorin and attempting to kill four others during a 20-minute rampage in Hainault, east London, on 30 April last year.

Jurors at the Old Bailey have been shown a four-minute video clip from 4 April, which was recovered from his iPhone after his arrest.

The Spanish-Brazilian national, from Newham in east London, appears to be reviewing a sword he says was “handmade in Japan” and “took more than a month to reach me”.

Dressed in a yellow hoodie, black shorts, toe socks and flipflops, and wearing headphones, he is standing on black mats next to a ginger cat he calls the “Wizard”.

A martial arts-style punching bag and another sword on a skateboard can be seen in the background.

“This just came through… Ninja stuff,” he says before opening a long box containing a sword. “So I’m sort of obliged to do some ninja stuff with the Wizard.”

Monzo also says “freaking sexy” and “ooh” as he lunges and makes different moves with the sheathed sword.

The court has previously heard Monzo was a “talented martial artist”.

Prosecutors said he “killed and skinned” his cat before driving his grey Ford Transit van at speed into pedestrian Donato Iwule.

He then struck him in the neck with the same weapon used to kill Daniel, who suffered “essentially a near-decapitation”, the jury was earlier told.

PC Yasmin Mechem-Whitfield was also repeatedly struck with the 60cm blade, before Monzo entered a nearby house and attacked a couple inside, then struck another police officer, it is alleged.

Monzo has pleaded guilty to two counts of possessing an offensive weapon – a katana sword and a tanto katana sword.

He denies charges of murder, attempted murder, wounding with intent, aggravated burglary and possession of a bladed article.

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The jury has been told there is no issue about who carried out the attacks and that Monzo was under the influence of cannabis at the time.

But prosecutors say his psychotic state was self-induced and does not meet the threshold for diminished responsibility.

The trial continues.