Outrage at McGuinness TV comments on Queen
SENIOR unionists have hit out at Martin McGuinness for calling for the Queen to apologise for Bloody Sunday ahead of any visit to the Republic.
Speaking on the RTE Parachute Regiment” and that he had never heard “Queen Elizabeth or any of her sons say anything about the murder of 14 people on the streets on my city”.
When pushed on the subject Mr McGuinness replied: “You can deduce from that, that I would not be enamoured by a visit from the Queen of England.”
East Londonderry MP Gregory Campbell hit out at the deputy first minister saying Mr McGuinness has never publicly apologised for his own involvement in a “failed campaign” of violence.
Mr Campbell said: “This comment means that a person who has openly admitted to being involved in an organisation whose specific purpose was to murder and maim, namely the Provisional IRA, but who has never publicly apologised for his involvement in that failed campaign, has asked for an apology from the Queen.”
The DUP MP said “the hypocrisy of this statement has clearly been lost on Martin McGuinness,” and added: “Hopefully this hypocrisy will do nothing to mar the first visit of the Queen to that country, particularly when Mary McAleese, the president of the Irish Republic, has been asked to make no similar such apology for the part her country’s government played in the creation of the IRA, despite her numerous visits to this country.”
Ulster Unionist MLA Danny Kennedy has also expressed his “anger and disgust” at the public comments made by the deputy first minister.
Mr Kennedy said he found the comments to be “deeply offensive and insulting given that the organisation in which Martin McGuinness was an activist and leading member, the IRA, murdered Lord Louis Mountbatten, HM Queen’s uncle, and countless members of HM Queen’s security forces and citizens”.
The assembly member for Newry and Armagh, said: “Once again the mask or balaclava of the deputy first minister slips to reveal his true feelings of bitterness and hatred of all things British.
“So much for his vision of a shared future, and regardless of the £200 million clearly wasted on the Bloody Sunday inquiry and subsequent apology from the prime minister.”
Mr Kennedy added: “It is clear that the sneering and hostile attitude of Martin McGuinness to the Royal family, and HM Queen in particular, continues to act as a serious barrier to genuine reconciliation, not only within the NI executive or assembly, but throughout the entire community.”
