Proclamation read at Easter Rising celebrations

The celebrations are underway for the 90th anniversary of the Easter 1916 Rising.

Tens of thousands of people are gathered in Dublin's O'Connell Street for the ceremony, which is also being observed by members of the Government, and the families of the rebels.

Following the lowering of the tri-colour over the GPO, Captain Tom Ryan read out the Proclamation, which asserted the right of the Irish people to self-determination, as Padraig Pearse did 90 years ago.

Most of the Proclamation was written by Pearse himself but the influence of James Connolly is clear in what is undoubtedly the most important paragraph when the leaders set out their vision for the country: “The Republic guarantees religious and civil liberty, equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and all of its parts, cherishing all of the children of the nation equally and oblivious of the differences carefully fostered by an alien government, which have divided a minority from the majority in the past.”

The document was signed by Thomas J. Clarke, Sean Mac Diarmada, Thomas MacDonagh, PH Pearse, Eamonn Ceannt, James Connolly, and Joseph Plunkett.