A "seven-hour terrorism fest" is how the DUP's Mr Ian Paisley Jr described yesterday's state burial of 10 men executed by British authorities over 80 years ago.
He criticised politicians for attending the funeral Mass and re-burial, saying it was insulting to unionists. "What we saw yesterday was a disgraceful seven-hour terrorism fest," the North Antrim MLA said.
"What we saw was the Irish state genuflecting before terrorism in an event which only served to further divide people on this island. It was politically motivated event to boost Bertie Ahern and which paid homage and revived the ghosts of republican terrorism," he said.
Mr Paisley criticised the homily given by Cardinal Cathal Daly, the former Catholic Primate of Ireland, at the funeral service for suggesting that the true inheritors of the ideals expressed by Kevin Barry and his colleagues were those committed to implementing the Belfast Agreement.
"I think the Cardinal's claim was crazy," Mr Paisley said. "If you sport that logic, then you are saying it is right to honour a loyalist gang like the Shankill Butchers on the basis that their colleagues later went on to support the Belfast Agreement," he said.
"I have no doubt there would be an outcry from people in the Republic of Ireland if monuments were to be erected to the Shankill Butchers using this sort of excuse, and yet yesterday they honoured delinquent child killers like Kevin Barry and his associates.
Tens of thousands of people lined the streets of Dublin yesterday to watch the 10 coffins pass through the city with an Irish Army escort.
The crowd maintained a respectful silence, broken by applause as the hearses passed by.
PA