SDLP Leader Colum Eastwood has said that he is deeply disappointed following Donald Trump's victory in the US Presidential race.

Commenting on the outcome of yesterday's election in the US, Mr Eastwood said that "politics is facing a dark and difficult moment".

He continued: "As Rowan Williams recently wrote, we are now understandably terrified about the potential triumph of a politics of resentment, fear and unchallengeable untruthfulness.

"That was true post Brexit; it feels so much truer now.

"As things fall apart, the centre ground is struggling to know what is worth holding on to. Mainstream politics remains uneasy and unsure as to its place, its power and its purpose.

"Donald Trump has swept in to fill this vacuum. Trump's victory was anti-establishment, anti-immigrant and most particularly anti-globalisation."

Mr Eastwood added that Trump's win was not so much a victory of right over left, but a victory of "fanatical and fantasy absolutism over a more considered, coherent and kinder politics".

He also repeated his stand that he would not attend a Trump White House. He concluded: "I choose to stand by a very different set of values than those displayed by this man.

"I will understand if those in government, North and South, feel a duty of office to attend. However, I feel it is important that as an Irish leader I take a stand, even if only small and only symbolic, for the kind of politics which we continue to believe in."

(MH)