Letter: Sinn Fein leader is fortunate that her daughter never saw TV images of the horrors of IRA violence

Mary Lou McDonald said that her daughter, four, was distressed to see a TV programme which featured Bloody Sunday (‘Mary Lou - Legacy Bill disgraceful,’ January 23).

Ms McDonald said: "She runs into the kitchen. She sobs in distress. She drags me by the hand and points to the television.

"The source of her fear – an episode of ‘Reeling in the Years’ covering 1972.

“My child fully believing the events of Bloody Sunday were unfolding, there and then. Her little mind experiencing the horror, in real time. Blue eyes, wide-eyed, inconsolable.

“It takes time to calm her down.”

How fortunate for Ms McDonald that her daughter’s distress wasn’t provoked by her seeing TV images of the horrors caused by the litany of PIRA atrocities over recent decades.

The mere thought of a mother attempting to ‘justify’ to a four year old, the cold-blooded murders of almost 2,000 innocent citizens by the PIRA (and other republican criminal gangs) appals me.

More importantly, it should appal those citizens of the Republic of Ireland countenancing voting for Sinn Fein.

The prospect of Mary Lou McDonald becoming the head of their country’s armed forces whilst publicly venerating PIRA murderers, and – according to the PSNI and Garda – whilst the so-called PIRA ‘army council’ oversees Sinn Fein with their ‘overarching strategy’, should sound alarm bells in Dublin, Brussels, London and Washington.

Closer to home, elected unionist, nationalist and Alliance MLAs have a moral duty not to support the election of Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill whilst she continues to believe that there was “no alternative” to the PIRA murdering and maiming thousands of citizens

The belief that Ms O’Neill in the role of first minister for Northern Ireland could represent the relatives of the PIRA’s innocent victims is insulting and offensive.

Until Sinn Fein disavow all the human rights abuses and criminal conduct undertaken by the PIRA and state clearly and unequivocally that there was never any justification for the heinous crimes of the PIRA, they are unfit for government in Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland.

Thomas Smyth, Belfast BT4