UK diplomat says Russia does not have weapons to wipe out Ireland and Britain

It comes after a Russian news programme simulated a nuclear attack off the coast of Donegal that it was said would wipe out Ireland and turn it into a “radioactive desert.”

"The Russians do not have this weapon. I'll say that again they do not have this weapon,” Everard said on RTÉ's Today with Claire Byrne.

"I think that everyone can sleep quite calmly in their beds tonight. Not afraid that they're going to wake up dripping wet with radioactive seawater."

He went on to criticise Russian propaganda saying: “it's part of a pattern of really nasty Russian threats against most of the civilised world and not just the UK and Ireland.”

"I think this shows a deep, deep Russian frustration with the humiliation that they're suffering in Ukraine...and by a country much, much smaller than it is and frankly being made look completely ridiculous."

Everard also said that summoning the Russian Ambassador, Yuri Filatov, would express Ireland's “displeasure at this depiction of a nuclear attack.”

"Threatening to obliterate anybody is unacceptable,” he said.

“But Russia at the moment is in the grip of a kind of national tantrum of frustration and rage at its failure to overrun Ukraine.”

"And I think there are big questions over how far we indulged this by, as it were, dignifying these outbursts with a sensible response.”

Senator Tom Clonan also said Filatov must answer questions over Russia’s nuclear threat to Ireland.

The Security and Defence analyst said that while he should not be expelled from Ireland he must be summoned to explain the threat.

“I would say to threaten the Irish people with violence [is unacceptable],” Clonan told Newstalk Breakfast.

“We are a neutral state, we have always been a positive actor in international affairs and we are members of the UN security council.”

“I really would like to see the UN and its secretary general take a much more vocal and active role in calling out Putin,” he continued.

“The concept of having an ambassador and a channel of communication is something that goes right back to medieval times, even during the most bitter conflicts in the past,” he said.

“So, I don’t think we are at that point yet but certainly [Ambassador Yuri] Filatov should be called in and we should be asking him to confirm, is this a plan? Is this something you are considering?”

The report came from Russian state TV anchor Dmitry Kiselyov, who spoke as a simulation of an underwater missile being set off in the Atlantic Ocean with the aim of attacking Great Britain.

Despite there being no mention of Ireland in the broadcast, the clip shows the country being obliterated by the weapon, a giant nuclear-capable torpedo dubbed Poseidon, first.

Kiselyov, who is known as “Putin's mouthpiece”, explains: “Another option is to plunge Britain into the depths of sea using Russia's unmanned underwater vehicle Poisedon.”