DUBLIN: Queen Elizabeth II was to visit the site of a British massacre and make a keynote speech at Dublin Castle on Wednesday, addressing old wounds on her groundbreaking state visit to the Irish Republic.
The British sovereign was due to visit Croke Park stadium, the spiritual home of Gaelic sports, where 14 people were killed in a bloody reprisal attack in 1920.
She was also to make her only major speech of the four-day trip at a state banquet held in the former seat of British power on the Emerald Isle. The tone and content is likely to set the barometer for the state of Anglo-Irish relations.
While noting the vast improvement since peace was established in British-ruled Northern Ireland, the 85-year-old is expected to tackle the tensions that have meant no British monarch set foot here in a century before her watershed visit began Tuesday.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said that while the trip was aimed at turning a new leaf, the hosts should not expect to hear apologies for Britain's colonial rule.
"We're not glossing over the past here," Hague told reporters at Dublin Castle.
"It is about recognising those events of the past, acknowledging those events but also showing how we can move on to the future.
"That is the right way to treat it rather than to think of it in terms of apologies."
In reality, the British monarch is not a political figure and Prime Minister David Cameron has already said sorry on behalf of the government for the Bloody Sunday killings in Londonderry in 1972.
However, the queen will visit the Croke Park, scene of the Bloody Sunday of 1920 -- a gesture that would have been unthinkable for most of her reign.
Wednesday's itinerary begins on a lighter note with a trip to the Guinness brewery.
One of Ireland's top tourist destinations, the site takes visitors through the brewing process behind one of the world-famous cultural symbols of Ireland -- a pint of the black stuff.
All cameras will be waiting for the monarch to raise a pint of stout.
The royal couple then visit Government Buildings, which houses Prime Minister Enda Kenny's offices and the Department of Finance. She will meet Kenny and Foreign Affairs Minister Eamon Gilmore.
The most sensitive parts of the day begins with a visit to the Irish National War Memorial Garden, which is dedicated to the 49,400 Irish soldiers killed in World War I.
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