A 14-year-old boy was badly injured today after being viciously attacked by three masked men with baseball bats embedded with nails in Northern Ireland.
The teenager was walking past shops in the loyalist Monkstown Estate in Newtownabbey, Co Down, when he was set upon and savagely beaten by the gang.
Police believe it was a paramilitary-style punishment attack.
A police spokesman said the child was recovering in hospital after suffering a broken arm and leg and severe bruising to his body.