Sinn Fein challenged over apparent double standards on commemorations

At an IRA commemoration in Mullaghbawn on Sunday, the North Belfast MP said: “For just as truth and justice applies equally to everyone, so too does the right to remember, and the right to commemorate”.

He said loyalists, police, and army all “remember and stand with the families of their loved ones” at commemorations, and added: “I will defend, without hesitation, their right to do so. There is nothing to celebrate in conflict, or in our difficult and painful past, but to commemorate those we have loved and lost is a right which everyone”.

That statement appears to be “out of step” with Sinn Fein’s approach to the RIC commemoration, DUP MLA Diane Forsythe has said.

In January 2020, Sinn Fein president Mary Lou McDonald lambasted those behind the plan to commemorate the RIC.

She said: "For any Irish government for advocate commemorating these organisations is shameful and it has rightly drawn much criticism. Deferral of this planned commemoration is a step in the right direction, but it's not enough. This event needs to be cancelled."

Ms Forsythe said Sinn Fein should explain the discrepancy.

“Sinn Fein is not a normal political party and the continual hat-tipping to the IRA is further proof. The Sinn Fein leadership needs to explain what has changed since January 2020,” she said.

Ms Forsythe said Sinn Fein caused “uproar” because the Irish government had even considered marking the centenary of the Royal Irish Constabulary.

"Indeed, Mary Lou McDonald described the proposed event as a ‘calculated insult’. This approach seems to be out of step with John Finucane’s speech at the South Armagh IRA commemoration.

"Why would commemorating the RIC be insulting for Mary Lou McDonald but commemorating the IRA not be insulting to IRA victims? Is John Finucane saying Mary Lou got it wrong about commemorating the Royal Irish Constabulary?“No one has a right to re-write history but it seems Sinn Fein wants to decide who can commemorate and who can’t yet with little to no thought for the innocent IRA victims.”