DUP LEADER AND First Minister of Northern Ireland Arlene Foster has said that police are investigating threats she has received online.

Foster confirmed to The Impartial Reporter that the PSNI is investigating the threats, including one that “wanted [her] beheaded”.

The reported threats were condemned by Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness, who stepped down from the role of Deputy First Minister earlier this week.

A number of MLAs also condemned the threats:

Foster has been under pressure since the emergence of the ‘cash for ash’ scandal, which led to McGuinness’s departure.

Sinn Féin has not put forward anyone to replace McGuinness, and if it doesn’t return as coalition partner by next Monday then a new round of elections will have to take place in Northern Ireland.

Foster said on Monday that she was “disappointed” in McGuinness, saying that “it is clear that Sinn Fein’s actions are not principled, they are political”.

On Wednesday, former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern described Foster’s suggestion that the mandatory power-sharing arrangement in Northern Ireland may have to be reviewed as “absolutely crazy and dangerous”.

Yesterday, McGuinness criticised the Irish Times for outlining the details of the illness he is suffering from.

“He’s had health problems, he’s going through treatment. He’s getting the best of care and I expect him to make a full recovery,” Pearse Doherty, Sinn Féin’s party’s finance spokesman in the Dáil, told Claire Byrne Live on RTE One.

Read: Martin McGuinness criticises the Irish Times, saying he wants his privacy respected during illness>