Death threats sent to Northern politicians as flag furore continues

Two senior Northern Irish politicians have received death threats.

Jeffrey Donaldson, a DUP member for Lagan Valley, was informed of the danger to him and his family by police yesterday.

A DUP minister in the North’s powersharing government at Stormont has also been threatened, it was revealed last night.

Mr Donaldson said: “Police [yesterday] morning received a serious threat to the effect that myself, my wife and children, and my colleague Edwin Poots, his wife and children, would be shot, and the police are treating this threat very seriously.”

Mr Poots is the health minister at Stormont and also MLA for Lagan Valley for the DUP.

East Belfast MP Naomi Long has also been targeted after her cross-community Alliance Party cast the crucial vote allowing Belfast City Council to reduce the number of days the union flag flies from the city hall.

Mr Donaldson was elected to Britain’s House of Commons in 1997. He said he was appalled by the latest development.

“Whatever they may think of my politics as a unionist and someone who is proud to be British, it is beyond belief that people would target my wife and children in this way,” he said.

“I won’t be intimidated by these threats, just as I have not been intimidated by such threats in the past, but this is the first time my family has been threatened in this way.”

He said he not only condemned threats against himself and Mr Poots but had consist-ently condemned those against other democratic politicians.

“Regardless of where these threats may have emanated from, this is an assault on democracy itself and when people resort to violence or threat of violence against democratically elected politicians then we really have gotten to a very low ebb.”