The Minister for Foreign Affairs has rubbished an interview with Donald Trump published in British papers today.
Charlie Flanagan says the interview in The Times of London was more of a "colour piece" than a formal interview.
The interview was carried out by former minister Michael Gove, who is still a backbencher in Theresa May's government.
Gove worked full-time with the paper before becoming an MP in 2005, and posed for a 'thumbs-up' picture with Trump afterwards.
In Brussels this morning Charlie Flanagan says Gove could not give a fair assessment of Trump, as he was not an impartial journalist.
In the interview - jointly conducted with Germany's Bild newspaper - Trump also pledged to strike an early trade deal with the UK shortly after taking office.
He also cited planning problems with his golf resort at Doonbeg, Co Clare, as an example of how the EU had become overbearing in domestic law.
"I went for an approval to do this massive, beautiful expansion... I got the approvals very quickly from Ireland and then Ireland and my people went to the EU to get the approval - it was going to take years - that was a very bad thing for Ireland," he said.
"From the environmental standpoint, they were using environmental tricks to stop a project from being built — I found it to be a very unpleasant experience.
"To get the approvals from the EU would have taken years. I don’t think that’s good for a country like Ireland so you know what I did? I said forget it, I’m not gonna build it."
In reality, Trump's Irish holding company had applied to build a 4,5km "berm structure", 4.5 metres in height, along a public beach to mitigate the effects of rising sea waters due to climate change.
However the plans encountered difficulty because of disruption to an area which is protected under EU directives, partly because it is the habitat of an endangered snail.
The plans were withdrawn in December but are to be revised and resubmitted. At no point did Ireland give the approvals 'very quickly', only to be overruled by European objections.
