For unionists there is nothing to celebrate in the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement: Jim Allister

He commented: “For unionists there is nothing to celebrate in the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement because the Belfast Agreement was a process designed to lead us ultimately to Irish unification.

"The Belfast Agreement was a fraud, a deceit, and something which was part of a process which evolved over the years of constant concessions, the On The Run letters, everything else.

"It had the most objectionable components – the release onto our streets of terrorists short of serving their full sentences, rewarded by government for their terrorism.

"Then some of them were ushered into government through a system of absurd mandatory coalition which could never work and has not worked, a system which lies in tatters before our very eyes.

"And all that in the context that we were told as unionists that we had a constitutional guarantee of the right to consent to any future constitutional change.”

Mr Allister said that the Northern Ireland Protocol made matters worse for unionists.

He said: "Then along comes the iniquitous protocol, trashes the acts of Union, leaves Article 6 – that foundation which guarantees the supposed economic union – in suspension according to the Supreme Court and yet we are told by the same court that there was no right to consent or dissent from that.

“So for unionism I find nothing, nothing to celebrate in the Belfast Agreement.”