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Posted by Jim on August 23, 2017
August 23rd
WTC
Retired Battalion Chief Joseph D. McKeon
Battalion 46
WAKE
Wednesday, August 23rd from 4-6pm & 7-9pm
Donohue Cecere Funeral Home
290 Post Ave
Westbury, NY 11590
516-333-0615
FUNERAL MASS
Thursday, August 24th at 10am
Our Lady of Hope RC Church
534 Broadway
Carle Place NY 11514
516-334-4908
All Off-Duty Members should attend in Class A Uniform.
Posted by Jim on
Brian Feeney. Irish News. Belfast. Wednesday, August 23, 2017
“Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes,” as they don’t say in the DUP. Beware of the Greeks even when they’re bearing gifts.
It refers to the Trojan horse which enabled the Greeks to get inside the impregnable walls of Troy and overwhelm the garrison from within.
Britain’s paper on the Border last week is their government’s attempt to create a Trojan horse.
Theresa May’s sweetness-and-light article she gave this paper alone is such an obvious trick it deserves to be unwrapped carefully to discover her real intention.
First, it was only published in this paper because it is mainly read by nationalists and the British know that 89 per cent of nationalists who voted voted Remain.
May set out to convince nationalists that the British totally support the Good Friday Agreement, which the official paper says was signed up to by eight parties in The North but ignores the fact that their partners in government, the DUP, didn’t sign up.
Well, the British support the Good Friday Agreement up to a point.
If you read the document, and hardly anyone has, you’ll see that in paragraph 6 the British say the Agreement, endorsed by referendums north and south, confirms that “Northern Ireland’s constitutional status is a matter for the people of Northern Ireland alone to determine”.
Naughty, naughty – no it’s not. The Good Friday Agreement actually says in Constitutional Issues paragraph (ii) “it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone by agreement between the two parts respectively and without external impediment to exercise their right of self-determination”.
The British paper reasserts their false reinterpretation again in paragraph 53 of their document.
Maybe no-one in Sinn Féin read the document or, if they did, didn’t understand the significance of the change – which is vitally important – or maybe they are asleep at the wheel again.
Twenty-four years ago, the IRA army council had to be convinced that the British recognised the Irish people’s right to self-determination.
It was enshrined in a carefully worded paragraph in the 1993 Downing Street Declaration which was shown beforehand to the IRA to gain their acquiescence.
Now the British government – which Theresa May claims puts the Good Friday Agreement “at the heart” of its Brexit negotiations – has cavalierly cast aside that bedrock position.
Laughably, they then go on to threaten Brussels that if they oppose the British proposals they are undermining the peace process by making Britain breach the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.
Now let’s have a look at how absurd this position is.
The Agreement is backed by an all-Ireland referendum and lodged as an international treaty which binds Britain legally to support and respect it. They can’t breach it.
It is the action of the British government which threatens the Good Friday Agreement, not Brussels’, which is not bound by the obligations of an international treaty.
Essentially the duplicitous British position claims that it is the big bad EU which is bullying the Irish government into imposing a hard Border but kindly John Bull is doing his best to protect Ireland’s interests.
Yet the truth is, in her contempt for the plight of northern Nationalists, no northern party – no, not even their bought-and-paid-for DUP suckers – was consulted about the paper on the Border.
To add insult to injury, May’s speechwriters altered a critical clause in the Good Friday Agreement, they are supposed to be the joint guarantors of, to enhance the position of Unionists.
So much for an Agreement they’re legally obliged to uphold.
Luckily, Irish government officials can read and will be pointing out to Michel Barnier this particular flaw in the British paper.
Luckily too, Barnier will tell the British their suggestions about the Border are impossible but not before he dismisses David Davis’s transparent attempt to bounce Brussels into abandoning their negotiating position that no matters of trade can be discussed until progress on the first three items that Davis – don’t forget – has already agreed to deal with.
They are: the rights of EU citizens (that’s you); the divorce bill; and, wait for it, the Irish border at a political level, not the mechanics of trade, which is really all the British are interested in.
Only a fool would fail to recognise May’s Trojan horse.
Brian Feeney. Irish News. Belfast. Wednesday, August 23, 2017
“Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes,” as they don’t say in the DUP. Beware of the Greeks even when they’re bearing gifts.
It refers to the Trojan horse which enabled the Greeks to get inside the impregnable walls of Troy and overwhelm the garrison from within.
Britain’s paper on the Border last week is their government’s attempt to create a Trojan horse.
Theresa May’s sweetness-and-light article she gave this paper alone is such an obvious trick it deserves to be unwrapped carefully to discover her real intention.
First, it was only published in this paper because it is mainly read by nationalists and the British know that 89 per cent of nationalists who voted voted Remain.
May set out to convince nationalists that the British totally support the Good Friday Agreement, which the official paper says was signed up to by eight parties in The North but ignores the fact that their partners in government, the DUP, didn’t sign up.
Well, the British support the Good Friday Agreement up to a point.
If you read the document, and hardly anyone has, you’ll see that in paragraph 6 the British say the Agreement, endorsed by referendums north and south, confirms that “Northern Ireland’s constitutional status is a matter for the people of Northern Ireland alone to determine”.
Naughty, naughty – no it’s not. The Good Friday Agreement actually says in Constitutional Issues paragraph (ii) “it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone by agreement between the two parts respectively and without external impediment to exercise their right of self-determination”.
The British paper reasserts their false reinterpretation again in paragraph 53 of their document.
Maybe no-one in Sinn Féin read the document or, if they did, didn’t understand the significance of the change – which is vitally important – or maybe they are asleep at the wheel again.
Twenty-four years ago, the IRA army council had to be convinced that the British recognised the Irish people’s right to self-determination.
It was enshrined in a carefully worded paragraph in the 1993 Downing Street Declaration which was shown beforehand to the IRA to gain their acquiescence.
Now the British government – which Theresa May claims puts the Good Friday Agreement “at the heart” of its Brexit negotiations – has cavalierly cast aside that bedrock position.
Laughably, they then go on to threaten Brussels that if they oppose the British proposals they are undermining the peace process by making Britain breach the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.
Now let’s have a look at how absurd this position is.
The Agreement is backed by an all-Ireland referendum and lodged as an international treaty which binds Britain legally to support and respect it. They can’t breach it.
It is the action of the British government which threatens the Good Friday Agreement, not Brussels’, which is not bound by the obligations of an international treaty.
Essentially the duplicitous British position claims that it is the big bad EU which is bullying the Irish government into imposing a hard Border but kindly John Bull is doing his best to protect Ireland’s interests.
Yet the truth is, in her contempt for the plight of northern Nationalists, no northern party – no, not even their bought-and-paid-for DUP suckers – was consulted about the paper on the Border.
To add insult to injury, May’s speechwriters altered a critical clause in the Good Friday Agreement, they are supposed to be the joint guarantors of, to enhance the position of Unionists.
So much for an Agreement they’re legally obliged to uphold.
Luckily, Irish government officials can read and will be pointing out to Michel Barnier this particular flaw in the British paper.
Luckily too, Barnier will tell the British their suggestions about the Border are impossible but not before he dismisses David Davis’s transparent attempt to bounce Brussels into abandoning their negotiating position that no matters of trade can be discussed until progress on the first three items that Davis – don’t forget – has already agreed to deal with.
They are: the rights of EU citizens (that’s you); the divorce bill; and, wait for it, the Irish border at a political level, not the mechanics of trade, which is really all the British are interested in.
Only a fool would fail to recognise May’s Trojan horse.
Posted by Jim on
Irish News. Belfast. Wednesday, August 23, 2017
TAOISEACH Leo Varadkar has said the British government’s stance on trading relations with the European Union after Brexit is “not a realistic position”.
Speaking during a three-day visit to Canada, he said the Republic’s government is “confused and puzzled” by what trade agreement the UK wants with the EU.
“At the moment they have the best trade deal possible, the best one imaginable, which is a customs union and access to the single European market and the European economic area,” he said.
“What they seem to be suggesting all along really for the last 14 months now is that they want to have all the advantages of being in the EU but none of the responsibilities and costs, and that’s not a realistic position.”
Speaking to Bloomberg, Mr Varadkar added: “It’s not yet clear to us these better deals that the British government really wants from Europe and from other countries, and I think some more clarity in that area would be very helpful.”
The Republic’s foreign affairs minister also warned British authorities yesterday that Ireland will not be used as a “pawn” in Brexit negotiations.
Simon Coveney also said sufficient progress on the future of the Border has not been made during Brexit talks.
Speaking ahead of a meeting with Northern Ireland Secretary James Brokenshire in Dublin, Mr Coveney said: “We do not want the Irish issue, the Border issue, to be used as a pawn to try to pressurise for broader trade agreements.”
He warned that in order for Brexit negotiations to move onto the next phase, “measurable and real progress” is needed.
Before the meeting, Mr Brokenshire insisted there was no possibility of the UK staying within a customs union post-Brexit.
He said that to do so would prevent the UK from negotiating international trade deals.
Following a meeting with the Irish and British Chamber of Commerce, he said there would be a period of implementation where the “UK would adhere closely to the existing customs union”.
“But ultimately it is about the UK being able to negotiate international trade deals. We want to harness those freedoms. If we were to remain in the customs union that would prevent us from doing so,” he said.
He added: “We are leaving EU, customs union and single market. We have set out options as to how we can achieve that frictionless trade.”
Mr Coveney said the Irish government believes the best way to progress “the complexity of Britain leaving the European Union is for Britain to remain very close to the single market and effectively to remain part of the customs union”.
“That would certainly make the issues on the island of Ireland an awful lot easier to manage.
“But of course the British government’s stated position is not in agreement with that but that doesn’t mean we won’t continue to advocate for that.
“In the absence of that it is up to the British government to come up with flexible and imaginative solutions to actually try to deal with the specific island of Ireland issues.”
Posted by Jim on August 20, 2017
Mickey Devine
A typical Derry lad
TWENTY-seven-year-old Micky Devine, from the Creggan in Derry city, was the third INLA Volunteer to join the H-Block hunger strike to the death.
Micky Devine took over as O/C of the INLA blanket men in March when the then O/C, Patsy O’Hara, joined the hunger strike but he retained this leadership post when he joined the hunger strike himself.
Known as ‘Red Micky’, his nickname stemmed from his ginger hair rather than his political complexion, although he was most definitely a republican socialist.
The story of Micky Devine is not one of a republican ‘super-hero’ but of a typical Derry lad whose family suffered all of the ills of sectarian and class discrimination inflicted upon the Catholic working-class of that city: poor housing, unemployment and lack of opportunity.
Micky himself had a rough life.
His father died when Micky was a young lad; he found his mother dead when he was only a teenager; married young, his marriage ended in separation; he underwent four years of suffering ‘on the blanket’ in the H-Blocks; and, finally, the torture of hunger-strike.
Unusually for a young Derry nationalist, because of his family’s tragic history (unconnected with ‘the troubles’), Micky was not part of an extended family, and his only close relatives were his sister Margaret, seven years his elder, and now aged 34, and her husband, Frank McCauley, aged 36.
CAMP
Michael James Devine was born on May 26th, 1954 in the Springtown camp, on the outskirts of Derry city, a former American army base from the Second World War, which Micky himself described as “the slum to end all slums”.
Hundreds of families – 99% (unemployed) Catholics, because of Derry corporation’s sectarian housing policy – lived, or rather existed, in huts, which were not kept in any decent state of repair by the corporation.
One of Micky’s earliest memories was of lying in a bed covered in old coats to keep the rain off the bed. His sister, Margaret, recalls that the huts were “okay” during the summer, but they leaked, and the rest of the year they were cold and damp.
Micky’s parents, Patrick and Elizabeth, both from Derry city, had got married in late 1945 shortly after the end of the Second World War, during which Patrick had served in the British merchant navy. He was a coalman by trade, but was unemployed for years.
At first Patrick and Elizabeth lived with the latter’s mother in Ardmore, a village near Derry, where Margaret was born in 1947. In early 1948 the family moved to Springtown where Micky was born in May 1954.
Although Springtown was meant to provide only temporary accommodation, official lethargy and sectarianism dictated that such inadequate housing was good enough for Catholics and it was not until the early ‘sixties that the camp was closed.
BLOW
During the ‘fifties, the Creggan was built as a new Catholic ghetto, but it was 1960 before the Devines got their new home in Creggan, on the Circular Road. Micky had an unremarkable, but reasonably happy childhood. He went to Holy Child primary school in Creggan.
At the age of eleven Micky started at St. Joseph’s secondary school in Creggan, which he was to attend until he was fifteen.
But soon the first sad blow befell him. On Christmas eve 1965, when Micky was aged only eleven, his father fell ill; and six weeks later, in February 1966, his father, who was only in his forties, died of leukaemia.
Micky had been very close to his father and his premature death left Micky heartbroken.
Five months later, in July 1966, his sister Margaret left home to get married, whilst Micky remained in the Devines’ Circular Road home with his mother and granny.
At school Micky was an average pupil, and had no notable interests.
STONING
The first civil rights march in Derry took place on October 5th, 1968, when the sectarian RUC batoned several hundred protesters at Duke Street. Recalling that day, Micky, who was then only fourteen wrote:
“Like every other young person in Derry my whole way of thinking was tossed upside down by the events of October 5th, 1968. I didn’t even know there was a civil rights march. I saw it on television.
“But that night I was down the town smashing shop windows and stoning the RUC. Overnight I developed an intense hatred of the RUC. As a child I had always known not to talk to them, or to have anything to do with them, but this was different
“Within a month everyone was a political activist. I had never had a political thought in my life, but now we talked of nothing else. I was by no means politically aware but the speed of events gave me a quick education.”
TENSION
After the infamous loyalist attack on civil rights marchers in nearby Burntollet, in January 1969, tension mounted in Derry through 1969 until the August 12th riots, when Orangemen – Apprentice Boys and the RUC – attacked the Bogside, meeting effective resistance, in the ‘Battle of the Bogside’. On two occasions in 1969 Micky ended up at the wrong end of an RUC baton, and consequently in hospital.
That summer Micky left school. Always keen to improve himself, he got a job as a shop assistant and over the next three years worked his way up the local ladder: from Hill’s furniture store on the Strand Road, to Sloan’s store in Shipquay Street, and finally to Austin’s furniture store in the Diamond (and one can get no higher in Derry, as a shop assistant).
British troops had arrived in August 1969, in the wake of the ‘Battle of the Bogside’. ‘Free Derry’ was maintained more by agreement with the British army than by physical force, but of course there were barricades, and Micky was one of the volunteers manning them with a hurley.
INVOLVED
At that time, and during 1970 and 1971, Micky became involved in the civil rights movement, and with the local (uniquely militant) Labour Party and the Young Socialists.
The already strained relationship between British troops and the nationalist people of Derry steadily deteriorated – reinforced by news from elsewhere, especially Belfast – culminating with the shooting dead by the British army of two unarmed civilians, Seamus Cusack and Desmond Beattie, in July of 1971, and with internment in August. Micky, by this time seventeen years of age, and also politically maturing, had joined the ‘Officials’, also known as the ‘Sticks’.
He became a member of the James Connolly ‘Republican Club’ and then, shortly after internment, a member of the Derry Brigade of the ‘Official IRA’.
‘Free Derry’ had become known by that name after the successful defence of the Bog side in August 1969, but it really became ‘Free Derry’, in the form of concrete barricades etc., from internment day. Micky was amongst those armed volunteers who manned the barricades
Typical of his selfless nature (another common characteristic of the hunger strikers), no task was too small for him.
He was ‘game’ to do any job, such as tidying up the office. Young men, naturally enough, wanted to stand out on the barricades with rifles: he did that too, but nothing was too menial for him, and he was always looking for jobs.
Bloody Sunday, January 30th, 1972, when British Paratroopers shot dead thirteen unarmed civil rights demonstrators in Derry (a fourteenth died later from wounds received), was a turning point for Micky. From then there was no turning back on his republican commitment and he gradually lost interest in his work, and he was to become a full-time political and military activist.
TRAUMA
Micky experienced the trauma of Bloody Sunday at first hand. He was on that fateful march with his brother-in-law, Frank, who recalls: “When the shooting started we ran, like everybody else, and when it was over we saw all the bodies being lifted.”
The slaughter confirmed to Micky that it was more than time to start shooting back. “How” he would ask, “can you sit back and watch while your own Derry men are shot down like dogs?”
Micky had written: “I will never forget standing in the Creggan chapel staring at the brown wooden boxes. We mourned, and Ireland mourned with us.
“That sight more than anything convinced me that there will never be peace in Ireland while Britain remains. When I looked at those coffins I developed a commitment to the republican cause that I have never lost.”
From around this time, until May when the ‘Official IRA’ leadership declared a unilateral ceasefire (unpopular with their Derry Volunteers), Micky was involved not only in defensive operations but in various gun attacks against British troops.
Micky’s commitment and courage had shone through, but no more so than in the case of scores of other Derry youths, flung into adulthood and warfare by a British army of occupation.
TRAGIC
In September, 1972, came the second tragic loss in Micky’s family life. He came home one day to find his mother dead on the settee with his granny unsuccessfully trying to revive her.
His mother had died of a brain tumour, totally unexpectedly, at the age of forty-five. Doctors said it had taken her just three minutes to die. Micky, then aged eighteen, suffered a tremendous shock from this blow, and it took him many months to come to terms with his grief.
Through 1973, Micky remained connected with the ‘Sticks’, although increasingly disillusioned by their openly reformist path. He came to refer to the ‘Sticks’ as “fireside republicans”, and was highly critical of them for not being active enough.
Towards the end of that year, Micky, then aged nineteen, got married. His wife, Margaret, was only seventeen. They lived in Ranmore Drive in Creggan and had two children: Michael, now aged seven and Louise, now aged five.
Micky and his wife had since separated.
In late 1974, virtually all the ‘Sticks’ in Derry, including Micky, joined the newly formed IRSP, as did some who had dropped out over the years. And Micky necessarily became a founder member of the PLA (People’s Liberation Army), formed to defend the IRSP from murderous attacks by their former comrades in the sticks.
In early 1975, Micky became a founder member of the INLA (Irish National Liberation Army) formed for offensive operational purposes out of the PLA.
The months ahead were bad times for the IRSP, relatively isolated, and to suffer a strength-sapping split when Bernadette McAliskey left, taking with her a number of activists who formed the ISP (Independent Socialist Party), since deceased.
They were also difficult months for the fledgling INLA, suffering from a crippling lack of weaponry and funds. Weakness which led them into raids for both as their primary actions, and rendered them almost unable to operate against the Brits.
Micky was eventually arrested on the Creggan. In the evening of September 20th, 1976, after an arms raid earlier that day on a private weaponry, in Lifford, County Donegal, from which the INLA commandeered several rifles and shotguns, and three thousand rounds of ammunition.
ARRESTED
Micky was arrested with Desmond Walmsley from Shantallow, and John Cassidy from Rosemount. Along on the operation, though never convicted for it, was the late Patsy O’Hara, with whom Micky used to knock around as a friend and comrade.
Micky was held and interrogated for three days in Derry’s Stand Road barracks, before being transported in Crumlin Road jail in Belfast where he spent nine months on remand.
He was sentenced to twelve years imprisonment on June 20th, 1977, and immediately embarked on the blanket protest. He was in H5-Block until March of this year when the hunger strike began and when the ‘no-wash, no slop-out’ protest ended, whereupon he was moved with others in his wing to H6-Block.
Mickey Devine final salute
Mickey Devine final salute
Like others incarcerated within the H-Blocks, suffering daily abuse and inhuman and degrading treatment, Micky realised – soon after he joined the blanket protest – that eventually it would come to a hunger strike, and, for him, the sooner the better. He was determined that when that ultimate step was reached he would be among those to hunger strike.
SEVENTH
On Sunday, June 21st, this year, he completed his fourth year on the blanket, and the following day he joined Joe McDonnell, Kieran Doherty, Kevin Lynch, Martin Hurson, Thomas McElwee and Paddy Quinn on hunger strike.
He became the seventh man in a weekly build-up from a four-strong hunger strike team to eight-strong. He was moved to the prison hospital on Wednesday, July 15th, his twenty fourth day on hunger strike.
With the 50 % remission available to conforming prisoners, Micky would have been due out of jail next September.
As it was, because of his principled republican rejection of the criminal tag he chose to fight and face death.
Micky died at 7.50 am on Thursday, August 201h, as nationalist voters in Fermanagh/South Tyrone were beginning to make their way to the polling booths to elect Owen Carron, a member of parliament for the constituency, in a demonstration – for the second time in less than five months – of their support for the prisoners’ demands.
Posted by Jim on August 19, 2017
The one sure way to enshrine free movement, free trade, and regulatory clarity in relations between the two parts of Ireland is to put them back together
Mary Dejevsky. Independent. London. Thursday, August 17, 2017
If you found the UK Government’s first Brexit “position paper” on avoiding a “cliff-edge” in trade borderline delusional, just try the second, on Northern Ireland. A lot of Irish magic will be needed if the proposals set out there are going to have any chance of success.
Three policies have commanded particular attention. On trade, most exchanges between Northern Ireland and the Republic would be regarded as local, and nothing to do with international rules at all. Except much hair-splitting about what constitutes small and medium-sized business. For the rest, tariff matters and payments would be handled by a whole new, hi-tech system – the UK’s track record of digital project management does not bode well.
As for the movement of people, well there would essentially be no need for change. Any risk that the Northern Irish-Republic of Ireland border could become a “back-door” into the UK (or vice versa) would be minimized because the Irish Republic is not – and would not be – a member of the Schengen, so the UK and Ireland could keep their own special passport-free regime, while keeping the outer borders secure.
Except that there are no passport or ID checks between the UK and Ireland, whatever sort of papers you carry. Indeed, the only way, travelling by road, you know you have crossed from the Republic into Northern Ireland is a sign saying that the speed limit is now posted in miles per hour. Any indication that you are crossing into another country is vanishingly discreet. Like it or not, there is a “back door” (which predates both countries’ EU membership). Whether this longstanding “special arrangement” can continue after Brexit is another matter. How feasible is a “soft” border between a member and non-member of the EU?
Then there is food safety. Standards in Northern Ireland, the position paper boasts, are high, so there is really no need for any special checks on goods crossing what would become the EU border. But how well would that cheerful acceptance survive the first whiff of contaminated eggs, horsemeat masquerading as beef, or whatever comes next – in either direction?
Such problems were always lurking in the event of a UK vote for Brexit, and to an extent, with two different currencies, opportunities for gaming the system were always there. Strangely, though, the devolutionary focus during the referendum campaign was almost entirely on Scotland. What would happen if the Scots voted differently, and by a large margin, from the rest? (They did.) Would this spur demands for a new independence referendum? (Yes, and no.) What would come next? (Too soon to say.)
But the effect of Scottish independence in the event of Brexit was comparatively clear-cut. Scotland would become an independent state. It would be recognised as such by the UK and internationally. It would re-join the EU (oh yes, it would); it could be required to join the euro and Schengen, and there might well be a “hard” border with England. But everyone would know the score.
The position with Northern Ireland is infinitely more difficult. And it was made more so because a majority of the Northern Irish voted to remain in the European Union. The margin (56 – 44 per cent) was not as sweeping as in Scotland (62 – 38 per cent), but it was solid. It was also bigger than the margin of victory for Leave in the UK as a whole (52-48), but also in England (53 – 47 per cent).
One reason why Northern Ireland, despite its unionist majority, voted more like Scotland than England or Wales may be that people on both sides of the sectarian divide saw EU membership as a kind of guarantee for the continuation of the Good Friday agreement that had (mostly) brought peace. Without the EU, the relatively relaxed relations with the Republic, the free movement of people and free trade across the border would all be called into question.
This is where we are now, with the UK trying desperately to hold on to the gains from EU membership as they relate to Northern Ireland, while preparing to break from the EU in almost every other respect. It is neither a logical nor comfortable position. No wonder Ireland’s Prime Minister, Leo Varadkar, recently expressed his frustration not just with the pace of negotiation, but with the whole UK approach.
Happily – and unhappily – there is a solution, which is as simple and obvious as it is elusive. The one sure way to enshrine free movement, free trade, and regulatory clarity in relations between the two parts of Ireland is to put them back together. The North would thus remain in the EU – which is what a majority of those who took part in the referendum voted for – while the rest of the UK, aka Great Britain, would leave. The only border needed would be the sea.
How feasible would this be? Alas, despite the pro-EU vote in Northern Ireland, not at all – at least in the short term. The Northern Ireland parties may be finding it hard to form a new power-sharing government, now that the politicians who made peace have left the scene, and the unionist share of the vote may be declining, but a forced march to unity risks the peace.
The differences are not to be underestimated. From a distance, it is easy to condemn the recent clashes in the American south as “only” about a monument. But monuments – and flags – cannot be dismissed lightly. Over the decades they have sealed Ireland’s division. One person’s patriot is another’s traitor. The two communities remain fenced off from each other in Belfast and (London)Derry; if they find it so hard to share a city, how can they share a country?
And yet… Is it really beyond the bounds of wise states-people to devise a solution? Would a clearly federated state not be possible; a state, what is more, with world-class guarantees for the rights of what would become the Protestant minority? Is the fear that would precipitate a resort to arms really still there?
Since the Brexit vote, the unity question has been very quietly, very tentatively, reopened, after 10 years in which the Good Friday Agreement had pronounced it closed. But a twist of fate – the Conservatives’ need for the DUP’s parliamentary votes – at once enhanced the status of the DUP in Northern Ireland and regrettably put any new thinking on hold.
But such an obvious remedy to the Brexit-Northern Ireland conundrum cannot remain off limits for ever. Demographic change in the North is already affecting elections there. Socially and economically, the Republic is a very different country from the one it was before it joined the EU. Arguably, the country that has changed least, in its institutional attitudes, is the UK.
If only it could fully accept the Republic of Ireland as an independent sovereign state, with no need for colonial-era privileges such as passport-free travel and votes in UK elections. If only it chose to halt the generous protection that stunts Northern Ireland’s development and allows a loyalist minority to live in the past. If the UK made moves in this direction, some of the biggest stumbling blocks in the Brexit negotiations would melt away – with the bonus of normalized relations between Great Britain and Ireland – even if, in the end, we decided not to leave.