Watch the Queen’s amazing response when Sinn Fein chief Martin McGuinness asks about her health
The former IRA leader had 20 minute audience with Her Majesty during her visit to Northern Ireland
THIS is the moment the Queen offers a brilliant comeback to Northern Irish Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness when he quizzes her about her health.
The former IRA man held a 20 minute audience with Her Majesty at the start of her two-day visit to Northern Ireland with the Duke of Edinburgh.
On arrival, the Sinn Fein chief greets the Queen with a handshake and asks: “Good evening. Hello. Are you well?”
The Queen, 90, then offers a crisp reply, saying: "Thank you very much. Well, I'm still alive, anyway.”
She adds: "We've been quite busy. There's been quite a lot going on."
McGuinness says: "There's a lot of things happening at the moment."
The Monarch then joked: "I've had two birthdays, so we've been quite busy."
It's not the first time the Royal has joked about her own mortality.
In March, former Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg revealed that in a private chat about changes to royal succession, he asked her: “I hope this change does not cause difficulties Ma’am?”
I've had two birthdays, so we've been quite busy
The Queen
McGuinness has acknowledged that he is a former IRA member but claims that he left the IRA in 1974.
He is now a member of Northern Ireland’s governing coalition.
The Royals has previously been the target of IRA attacks.
The Duke of Edinburgh's uncle Earl Mountbatten of Burma was murdered aged 79 by the IRA in a bomb attack on August Bank Holiday Monday 1979.
Thomas MacMahon was convicted in November 1979 of the murders.
He was released in 1998 under the Good Friday Agreement.
There is no suggestion McGuinness had anything to do with the attack.
The Queen and Prince Phillip are today due to tour Northern Ireland's north coast tomorrow, including the famous Giant's Causeway stones.
They will also unveil a statue to Robert Quigg, a soldier awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery during the Battle of the Somme.
The IRA murder of Earl Mountbatten in 1978
Earl Mountbatten usually holidayed at his summer home, Classiebawn Castle, in Mullaghmore, a small seaside village in County Sligo, Ireland.
The village was only 12 miles from the border with Northern Ireland and near an area known to be used as a cross-border refuge by IRA members.
In 1978, the IRA had allegedly attempted to shoot Mountbatten as he was aboard his boat, but "choppy seas had prevented the sniper lining up his target".
Despite security advice and warnings from the Garda Síochána, on 27 August 1979, Mountbatten went lobster-potting and tuna fishing in his 30-foot wooden boat, the Shadow V.
IRA member Thomas McMahon had slipped onto the unguarded boat that night and attached a radio-controlled bomb weighing 50 pounds.
When Mountbatten was aboard, just a few hundred yards from the shore, the bomb was detonated.
The boat was destroyed by the force of the blast, and Mountbatten's legs were almost blown off.
Mountbatten, then aged 79, was pulled alive from the water by nearby fishermen, but died from his injuries before being brought to the shore.
Also aboard the boat were his eldest daughter Patricia (Lady Brabourne), her husband John (Lord Brabourne), their twin sons Nicholas and Timothy Knatchbull, John's mother Doreen, (dowager) Lady Brabourne, and Paul Maxwell, a young crew member from County Fermanagh.
Nicholas (aged 14) and Paul (aged 15) were killed by the blast and the others were seriously injured.
Doreen, Lady Brabourne (aged 83) died from her injuries the following day.
The IRA issued a statement afterward, saying: "The IRA claim responsibility for the execution of Lord Louis Mountbatten.
"This operation is one of the discriminate ways we can bring to the attention of the English people the continuing occupation of our country."