Sabina Higgins

Her letter stated: “Until the world persuades President Putin of Russia and the President of Ukraine [Volodymyr Zelenskiy] to agree to a ceasefire and ...

At no time did the letter appear on any other part of the website.” Having put my letter up, I subsequently took it down when I saw it being presented as not being from myself, but from the general President.ie website. Since 2014, I have had a dedicated section on the President.ie website. Unfortunately, in the meantime, the Kremlin did use her letter for propaganda purposes and she could have made clear earlier that this was not acceptable. Mrs Higgins’s letter to The Irish Times was heavily criticised because, when calling for ceasefire negotiations, she seemed to apportion equal responsibility to both presidents but omitted to state that the war in Ukraine had started when Russia invaded the neighbouring country. She said she was “dismayed” that people had criticised her call for a ceasefire.

Mrs. Higgins faced backlash after a letter about the conflict in Ukraine, published in the Irish Times, was also then reported to have been published on the ...

The senator had described Sabina Higgins’ letter as a “slap in the face” to Ukrainian refugees who had fled the war and arrived in Ireland. A spokesperson for President Higgins said that he “has repeatedly condemned what he has described as the illegal, immoral and unjustifiable Russian invasion of Ukraine. He has called for an immediate Russian withdrawal and end to the violence." In the letter, she wrote that the war will continue “until the world persuades President Vladimir Putin of Russia and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine to agree to a ceasefire and negotiations”.

The President's wife Sabina Higgins has broken her silence on the controversial letter she wrote which has been criticised for not condemning the illegal ...

"I therefore put it on my dedicated section of the website as I have done for the last number of years. "I would like to see an apology given. We still need to hear from the President himself.” "Since 2014, I have had a dedicated section on the President.ie website. “It is incumbent on the President of Ireland to now express clearly the strong support of the people of Ireland for the people of Ukraine and that we hold Russia responsible for the war and ongoing barbarism.” We need to clarify the role (if any) of the spouse or partner of any sitting president.

President Michael D Higgins' wife received widespread criticism for a letter she wrote in response to an editorial published in The Irish Times on the war ...

I therefore put it on my dedicated section of the website as I have done for the last number of years," Mrs Higgins added. At no time did the letter appear on any other part of the website." Mrs Higgins was widely criticised over the weekend for writing a letter in response to an editorial published in The Irish Times on the war in Ukraine.

Sabina Higgins, the wife of Irish President Michael D Higgins, has defended a letter she wrote which critics claimed drew an equivalence between the actions ...

“He has called for an immediate Russian withdrawal and end to the violence. “I therefore put it on my dedicated section of the website as I have done for the last number of years. “Since 2014, I have had a dedicated section on the president.ie website.

It is a “worry” that a letter from Sabina Coyne Higgins, wife of Michael D Higgins, to a newspaper ended up on the official website of the President, ...

However, Mr Ross added that the letter should not have appeared on the president's official website, which he said had been a mistake. We're confusing two issues here — one is it shouldn't have gone on the website, that was wrong. Erin McGreehan tweeted that Mr Higgins has “disrespected our nation & the Office of the Presidency when he published his wife’s letter. “The idea that the president should now come in and defend his wife's position is to me somewhat ridiculous. However, he accepted the letter had been written with “good intentions”. She said the paper's editorial pages had not mentioned any move towards a ceasefire.

A Fianna Fáil senator has called on Sabina Higgins, the wife of President Michael D Higgins, to apologise for posting her own private opinion on the ...

"And while Ms Higgins obviously wrote the letter, as I take it with good intentions, it is a worry that the Russian ambassador welcomed the intervention that she made, and it is a worry that that letter ended up on the official website of the Áras." But Senator McGreehan has called on Ms Higgins to apologise for posting her own opinion on the President's official website and has demanded clarity on why - as she put it - a private citizen's opinion was published there. A Fianna Fáil senator has called on Sabina Higgins, the wife of President Michael D Higgins, to apologise for posting her own private opinion on the President's official website.

The politics professor says the letter damaged Ireland's reputation regarding its position on Russia's war against Ukraine.

Sabina Higgins wrote in that letter of a “moral choice” that must be faced. The letter finishes with reference to the First World War, a conflict between empires fighting for no great cause, which is easy to depict as senseless. The only clue we got was Higgins’ reference to an op-ed written by retired history professor Geoffrey Roberts in which he argues that the carving up of Ukraine by Russia is inevitable and so Ukrainians should be persuaded to settle now or lose more land/people later. In a statement yesterday evening, Higgins clarified that she had “strongly condemned the illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine” from the outset. Sabina Higgins has since clarified that the letter was published to a dedicated section on the President.ie website which she has had since 2014. It is implied that presidents Putin and Zelenskyy have an equal responsibility to stop the carnage. The principled and only position of Ireland”. This is hardly a model Ukrainians would be keen to follow. Ukrainian MP Kira Rudik said it was “extremely easy to comment on the war when you are not inside the war, and when it is not your country that is being attacked”. This magnified in a very significant way the perception that the letter somehow represented an official position or had the president’s imprimatur. Former Ukrainian first lady, Kateryna Yushchenko said she was “saddened and surprised” that the letter didn’t recognise Ukraine’s existential threat. It has unnecessarily damaged Ireland’s reputation regarding its position on Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Questions still remain as to how Sabina Higgins' letter ended up on the President of Ireland's website, according to Senator Malcolm Byrne.

"I read the letter on the Irish Times last week and, while I agreed with some elements of it, I had difficulty with some elements of the letter. While the letter has been since been removed from the website, Senator Byrne said clarity is needed on how it ended up there. “Mrs Higgins is entitled to her view as a private citizen.