Gerry Adams slams Irish Government over its Northern Ireland stance

Adams described the coalition government as being “asleep at the wheel” on its responsibilities to Northern Ireland.

The former President of Sinn Féin Gerry Adams has dismissed remarks made by Tánaiste Micheál Martin in which the Fianna Fáil leader stated that Sinn Féin had “over-glorified” paramilitary violence during The Troubles.

Mr. Martin was speaking at a live Q and A session at the JFK library in Boston last month when he made the comments.

Alongside Boston Globe journalist Kevin Cullen, the Tánaiste told the near-200-strong audience that Sinn Féin needed to “deal with the past” and cease in its attempts to “justify terrible atrocities and acts of violence”.

“Sinn Féin, in my view, have over-glorified what happened in the last 30 years, and haven’t responded sufficiently to the victims of violence that they were responsible for”, the former Taoiseach stated.

In the lead up to next week’s 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, Gerry Adams appeared on RTE Radio 1’s Morning Ireland on Friday, in which Mr. Martin’s comments were put to him.

Mr. Adams responded by saying that we “all need to be careful with how we deal with the past”.

The retired politician went on to add that “Micheál Martin glorifies, rightly if you like, the men and women of the IRA of Cork in his time. I don’t glorify. I deal with the reality. The people made a stand here”.

Host Aine Lawlor also asked Mr. Adams for a response to comments made by Nichola McKee Corner, the sister of murdered journalist Lyra McKee, in which she said that many young people in the North are being pulled down a road of glorifying The Troubles.

The former President of Sinn Féin answered that he would “take that from Lyra McKee’s sister but I won’t take it from Micheál Martin”.

A frustrated Adams then took aim at Mr. Martin’s frequent referrals to the IRA as a political stick used to poke Sinn Féin with;

“Let’s look to the future in all of this. It is nothing short of ridiculous that twenty five years on, without institutions in place, when Republicans are playing a very very positive role, when the IRA has gone away. Here we are talking about the IRA. In God’s name. With no institutions in place”.

Next going on to accuse the current coalition government of being “asleep at the wheel” in terms of its responsibilities to the North, Mr. Adams said that the government had been “putting up with a British government which has no instinct whatsoever for this place- right, wrong or indifferent. Unionist or Nationalist”.

Amid the descending of some of the globe’s most prominent political figures upon Northern Ireland next week, tensions have been ratcheting up between the PSNI and factions of dissident Republicans.

Reports suggest that a group labelling themselves as the New IRA, is planning to attack PSNI officers in Derry to coincide with the visits of both Joe Biden and Rishi Sunak, as they seek to garner global media attention.

Speaking to that historic visit by US President Joe Biden, Mr. Adams was asked about the American President’s decision to not visit the Stormont Assembly during next week’s visit.

“I sympathise with him not going. Why would he go to an empty building? He might as well go to a wake. It is silliness to make a story out of that. I hope he has a good trip”, stated the former Sinn Féin leader.

The Northern Irish Assembly has not sat since February of 2022, despite Sinn Féin’s historic election win three months later, due to Unionist protests over the Northern Ireland Protocol.

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