Following a hoax bomb attack in North Belfast today, which police have stated was carried out by loyalist paramilitaries, Ulster Unionist Party leader, Doug Beattie MC MLA, said:

“The Ulster Unionist Party condemns without reservation the disruption caused to the visit to north Belfast this morning of Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney TD. At a time when most of the world is joined in solidarity to oppose the brutal oppression of the people of Ukraine, it is simply shocking that a working man, going about his business driving a van for a living, should be traumatised by terrorists insisting he drive what he is told is a device into a carpark.

“Apart from the irony that Mr Coveney was speaking about the suffering in Ukraine as part of his speech on reconciliation, a speech he can deliver again, a grieving family burying a loved one had to hold their funeral mass outdoors, something that cannot be undone. Relatives were denied their right to pay their respects as planned.” 

Ulster Unionist spokesperson for North Belfast, Julie-Anne Corr-Johnston, expressed her frustration: "This is from an era that should never have happened and that we should have condemned to history a long time ago. How ironic that on the weekend that two great north Belfast men, Sir Kenneth Brannagh and Ciaran Hinds hope to deliver an Oscar for Belfast, we have this act from people with nothing positive to offer."

Former Leader Mike Nesbitt MLA, who was in attendance as a Trustee of the John & Pat Hume Foundation, said:

"I was born and bred in this City and am proud to say so. I view what happened this morning with anger and disgust in equal measure. If you want to protect the Union, you should realise that denying free speech to a democratically elected minister from a neighbouring state plays directly into the Irish Republican narrative. Today was an own goal by faceless, nameless and frankly brainless individuals."