The Foreign Affairs Minister believes it was prudent for him to delete text messages between himself and Katherine Zappone.
Simon Coveney also cleared messages between himself and the Tanaiste and says he regularly does this as he was hacked in the past.
He says there was no huge mystery to Katherine Zappone’s now defunct appointment as a special UN envoy but says it was a mistake that he didn’t tell the Taoiseach.
The Minister says he often deletes his texts.
"I clear my phone on quite a regular basis.
"I change my phone every year, I've been hacked.
"I'm the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence, and I think it's prudent that I clear my phone fairly regularly, and that's what I do, and that's what I said yesterday."
