British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak traveled to Northern Ireland on Tuesday to convince people of the benefits of the “historic” agreement reached with the European Union (EU) on post-Brexit provisions, hoping to put an end to more a year of political deadlock in the province.
After months of tension, Rishi Sunak and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen presented a new agreement on Monday amending the Northern Ireland protocol, which is supposed to offer practical solutions to supply difficulties and political concerns created by the old compromise.
The once-dreaded sausage war will not happen: British chilled meat can be sold on Northern Irish shelves, while English people can send parcels to loved ones in Belfast without customs declaration or travel to Ireland du Nord with their dog without a veterinary certificate.
Rishi Sunak must now convince the main unionist party, the ultra-conservative Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), fiercely opposed to the old Northern Irish protocol, to adhere to the new compromise and lift its boycott of the local executive, paralyzed for a year. The movement reserves its response.
This is “a fantastic agreement that meets everything that matters to people”, assured Rishi Sunak while visiting a Coca-Cola factory near Belfast. “So now I hope they’ll see that’s the case and find a way to get back together,” he said, without naming the DUP.
” The impossible ” ?
Dubbed the “Windsor framework”, the new agreement aims in particular to allow more fluid trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, these having been made complex with the old protocol negotiated in 2020 by Boris Johnson.
This protocol wanted to avoid a border between Ireland and Northern Ireland which would risk undermining peace after decades of conflict, while protecting the single European market.
It created a de facto border in the Irish Sea, unacceptable for the Unionists, who defend the province’s membership of the United Kingdom. It also posed practical problems, in particular by imposing customs controls on products arriving in Northern Ireland from Great Britain.
With the new compromise, only goods destined to be exported to the Republic of Ireland, therefore to the single European market, will be subject to controls.
Approaching the 25the anniversary in April of the peace agreement having ended the bloody Troubles (3,500 dead in three decades), the agreement was hailed on Monday as an “essential step” for peace by the American president, Joe Biden, and greeted with enthusiasm by Paris, Berlin, Dublin and British business circles.
“Has Rishi achieved the impossible? » title tuesday the tabloid The Daily Mail. For The Telegraphit is the Prime Minister’s “best day” since arriving in Downing Street in October.
While the text must be submitted to the vote of the deputies, Prime Minister Sunak must explain himself Monday afternoon to elected representatives of his majority, in particular the “European research group” which brings together eurosceptics.
The position of the DUP
If the British government seems for the moment to have avoided the feared revolt of the right wing of its majority, it remains to be seen what the position of the DUP will be, opposed to any questioning of the place of Northern Ireland within from the United Kingdom.
The party has been blocking the functioning of the local executive for a year, demanding an abandonment of the protocol and refusing any de facto application of European law in the British province.
To address unionist concerns, the local parliament will have a mechanism to block the application of new EU rules in Northern Ireland.
The leader of the DUP, Jeffrey Donaldson, estimated on Tuesday that the agreement addressed “in part the concerns”: “There remain issues on which we continue to discuss with the government and we will take our time” to study it.
Ian Paisley, a DUP MP, has already said the new deal was “not up to par”.
“It is quite understandable that [les unionistes du DUP] please review the details of this project, ”reacted on Sky News the British Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly. But “if they do not return to the power-sharing executive, it will be extremely disappointing.”