A woman who has accused Jeffrey Donaldson of sexually abusing her as a child has rejected suggestions that a letter of “apology” he wrote her did not relate to the abuse but was instead linked to an extramarital affair, Newry Crown Court has heard.The woman, known as Complainant A, described the former DUP leader as a “very clever man” who would not admit to abuse in a letter he sent in June 2020, in which he said he regretted “all the hurt, pain and distress I have caused” and described himself as a “sinner”.The jury of seven men and five women also heard Donaldson’s wife, Eleanor Donaldson, had a listening device planted in his car because she suspected he was having an affair with a constituent.During cross-examination on the second day of evidence at Newry Crown Court, Complainant A – whose identity is protected by law – told the jury she believed the letter was one of “apology for what he [Donaldson] did to me over the years”.Defence lawyer Kieran Vaughan asked Complainant A why she did not hand the letter to police until three days after the PSNI interviewed her in 2024.The witness said she “couldn’t recall” the reason.“I didn’t think it was relevant at the time ... [but] I think it is very relevant,” she said.Vaughan suggested that letter did not relate to the alleged childhood sexual abuse but had a different “context” and that Donaldson was apologising for other behaviour.Complainant A rejected the defence barrister’s version of events.The defence barrister said the “proper context of this letter is a marital dispute that led to him being kicked out of the house”.The Donaldsons split up for a period in 2020, the court heart, and Eleanor Donaldson had a listening device planted in his car to get evidence about a suspected affair.Under cross-examination, the defence lawyer put it to the witness that the letter “had nothing to do with you” and the alleged sexual assault.“He wrote this [letter] specifically to me. It did not detail the words ‘sexual abuse’,” Complainant A replied.There were “heavy connotations of guilt and shame and asking for my forgiveness” in the letter, she told jurors.“I do not agree with your version of events,” the witness told the barrister.Complainant A told the court the defendant was “a very clever man ... [and] given the success of his career, he would never had written what he had done [about the abuse] in a letter”. She said he could “heavily suggest it”.“You can write a letter and you can hint at what you have done but that is not an apology,” she added.“He is using that letter as a form of apology but it is not a form of apology I accept ... because he is not acknowledging what he has done.”The woman is one of two alleged female victims who has accused Donaldson of sexually abusing them as children.Jeffrey Donaldson (63), with an address in Dromore, Co Down, is accused of 18 offences – one count of rape, four counts of gross indecency with or towards a child, and 13 counts of indecent assault on a female, on dates between 1985 and 2008. He denies the charges.His wife, Eleanor Donaldson (60), of the same address, is charged with five counts of aiding and abetting in connection with the charges faced by her husband – charges she denies.Eleanor Donaldson. File photograph: Liam McBurney/PA Eleanor Donaldson is not present in court as she has been ruled unfit to stand trial on the basis of medical evidence.She will instead face a trial of the facts – which replaces a criminal trial in such circumstances – which will run concurrently with her husband’s trial, which began this week.Earlier on Friday, Complainant A rejected suggestions by Vaughan that alleged abuse, including “touching of her breasts” when she was 12 or 13 years of age by Donaldson, did not happen.It was also claimed by Complainant A that Eleanor Donaldson witnessed Jeffrey Donaldson touching her breasts but did not intervene.The defence barrister said this claim was “nonsense”.Complainant A replied: “I would suggest that’s very insulting.”Vaughan also suggested that a separate incident, in which she alleged Donaldson shone a bright light at her “genital area” while she was sleeping, did not happen in way she described.“The light was bright, blinding my ability to focus,” she told the court.“I believe he was looking at my private parts. The light was moving and it was focused on my genital area.”She said she was telling the truth.“Facts are facts and I am sticking to those,” she told the barrister.The woman told the jury she was “conditioned” to the abuse. “This is a practice that had spanned years,” she said.She had “lived with lies and secrets for most of my life”, adding: “I have tried to suppress what has been done to me.”The trial continues.