It is more than 20 years since Alex Maskey became the first Sinn Féin Lord Mayor to pay his respects to the war dead at the Cenotaph in Belfast City Hall.

On On July 1, 2002, he laid a laurel wreath at the monumenttwo hours before the main council ceremony to commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of the Somme.

Maskey described his gesture as a “major step for republicans and nationalists on this island”.

However, he did not attend the main ceremony that year, refusing to take part in a “military commemoration” of the First World War battle.

Since then, Sinn Féin politicians have always refused to attend wreath-laying ceremonies at the Cenotaph in any official capacity.

In the intervening years, there have been other premieres and many other gestures in an attempt to promote reconciliation and good relations.

In 2016, the late Martin McGuinness traveled to France and Belgium as part of a two-day tour of the First World War battlefields.

He laid wreaths at the sites of the Somme and the Battle of Messines a century earlier.

In July 2022, Michelle O’Neill laid a wreath at the Cenotaph in Belfast to commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of the Somme.

However, she refused to be drawn into why she did not attend the wider Somme commemoration event at the same venue that year.