Battle of the Somme: TUV accuses Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill of setting up own commemoration to set media agenda

By Philip Bradfield
Published 1st Jul 2022, 18:51 BST
Updated 1st Jul 2022, 19:00 BST
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TUV party secretary Ron McDowell has accused Sinn Fein of deliberately setting up its own Somme commemoration event in order to set the media agenda.

“Around the world the poppy is recognised as the symbol of remembrance,” he said. “We can all see at the annual national ceremony of remembrance at the Cenotaph that it still employed by many nations which fought for freedom in two World Wars. It is not for Sinn Fein to seek to reshape remembrance either by disregarding the poppy or by holding its own self-styled act of remembrance distinct from that organised by the British Legion for the benefit of cameras and a press all too willing to repeat their talking points.

“The poppy is a particularly appropriate symbol of remembrance of the price paid for freedom given its direct link to the battle fields of France. This was of course immortalised in John McCrae’s “In Flander’s Fields”.

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“If Sinn Fein expect applause from Unionists for their actions today they have another thing coming. Their attempts to use it for political purposes is transparent.

Belfast Lord Mayor Tina Black (left) with Sinn Fein Vice-President Michelle O'Neill lay a wreath at the Cenotaph in Donegall Square West in Belfast, marking the anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916. They held their own event, two hours before the main ceremony, attended by the Irish government. Picture date: Friday July 1, 2022.Belfast Lord Mayor Tina Black (left) with Sinn Fein Vice-President Michelle O'Neill lay a wreath at the Cenotaph in Donegall Square West in Belfast, marking the anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916. They held their own event, two hours before the main ceremony, attended by the Irish government. Picture date: Friday July 1, 2022.
Belfast Lord Mayor Tina Black (left) with Sinn Fein Vice-President Michelle O'Neill lay a wreath at the Cenotaph in Donegall Square West in Belfast, marking the anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916. They held their own event, two hours before the main ceremony, attended by the Irish government. Picture date: Friday July 1, 2022.

“Real reaching out as far as I am concerned would be telling the truth about the Enniskillen bombing when Republicans murdered a dozen people for the crime of remembering the price paid for freedom.”

The Battle of the Somme in 1916 was a costly and largely unsuccessful Allied offensive on the Western Front during World War I. British and French forces launched a frontal attack against an entrenched German army north of the Somme River in France. A weeklong artillery bombardment was followed by a British infantry assault on the still-impregnable German positions. Nearly 60,000 British casualties occurred on the first day. The offensive gradually deteriorated into a battle of attrition, hampered by torrential rains. There were 650,000 German casualties and 420,000 British, many of them Protestants and Catholics from the island of Ireland, as well as 195,000 French.