Dublin's Lord Mayor defends 1996 photo of Union flag burning
Dublin's Lord Mayor has defended a photo of him burning a Union Jack flag, which has emerged online during Queen Elizabeth's visit to the North.
It was taken in 1996, and posted on Twitter by the Progressive Unionist Party, with the caption "the Dublin mayor burning the union flag. Oh that's right they don't burn flags."
The Dublin mayor burning the union flag . Oh that's right they don't burn flags pic.twitter.com/v8uvNMK6vH
— North Down PUP (@DownPUP) June 22, 2014
Christy Burke said the photo comes from his Sinn Féin days. He left the party in 2009, three days after winning his local election seat as a candidate for the party.
However, he said he still stands by his decision to protest in that manner.
"I've no apologies, I've no regrets of any of that," he said.
"There was pain on every side, everybody suffered equally. There was a war, there was conflict, and I believed when I joined the Republican movement, that was the right thing to do – and I still stand by that today."
