The UK rejects the EU timetable for negotiations. A border solution will have to wait

A pat on the back is due for Slugger for anticipating this reaction  to the EU negotiating guidelines. The FT (£)  has picked up Brexit Secretary David Davis’s interview on ITV’s Peston show yesterday   “How on earth do you resolve the issue of the border with Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland unless you know what our general borders policy is, what the customs agreement is, what our trade agreement is?” he told ITV’s Robert Peston. “It’s wholly …

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The inevitable conclusion to the abstention debate.

In 2015 there were numerous news stories and debates about the possibility of Sinn Féin ending its abstentionist policy partly fuelled by a belief that the election might produce a hung parliament. This time around the airing of those arguments have lessened significantly. The polls predict a Tory majority. However the SDLP believe its still a republican weak spot to target every time a Westminster election is called. An area that puts clear blue water between the two parties. In …

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Brendan Duddy RIP. A peace maker in real time

It is remarkable, in an age of sophisticated  back channels and espionage  replete with digital  and satellite communications, how a modest domestic background figured so  significantly in the moves which eventually led to the ceasefires – and all the more effectively for it. The problem was how to establish  trust when contacts had to be deniable, were often dangerous and were frequently interrupted by another  piece of violence. Key contacts were often made in Derry, presumably because the town  never …

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Fake News and False Balance undermine Victims’ Human Rights

Last weekend was the second anniversary of the rightsinfo.org website. To mark the event, a panel discussion took place during which the site’s founder Adam Wagner stated that “fake news was old news in human rights” and that people “have been convinced by newspapers for years and years that human rights are a villain.” He was joined at the panel discussion by Buzzfeed Special Correspondent James Ball who said “The bigger problem is…essentially the much wider ecosystem of material which …

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Tony Blair assures EU that May is sincere about a frictionless border; sees need for small amendment to the GFA

Am I on my own in becoming weary of  yet another of the great and  good  speaking in general terms about the future of the Border?  Tony Blair, addressing a European People’s Party gathering in Co Wicklow  was at pains to  declare his confidence in Theresa May’s sincerity over wanting a “ frictionless “border, even though  by rejecting  continuing membership of the single market and free movement   she has made it the  problem without a solution so far. “I …

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Special status for the North is a possibility from Barnier’s speech. Would the UK agree?

EU negotiator Michel Barnier and the Irish government seem to be inching their way towards special status – sorry – arrangements, for the North. The EU is there for you, Ireland and so is a close partnership with the UK based on a fair free trade agreement – but ( only!) after sufficient progress on EU citizens’ rights and the financial settlement. So declared Michel Barnier in a speech to the Oireachtas that seemed designed to calm the worst Irish …

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Review of Embodied Peacebuilding by Leah Robinson – A Theology of Reconciliation that is not Practical is not Reconciliation at all

In Northern Ireland, ‘reconciliation’ can be a divisive word – so much so that the very use of the term accomplishes the opposite of its meaning. A prominent study led by Prof John Brewer concluded that ‘reconciliation’ was so contested that the term should be avoided altogether. My own surveys of clergy and churchgoers revealed that almost no one can agree about what reconciliation actually means. Despite this, I still think that the concept of reconciliation can add something of value …

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The Persecution of Stephen Fry, and Ireland’s need for a new constitution

Ireland – a country lately undergoing a thoroughgoing, much-needed update in the eyes of the world – now has been in the curious position of investigating Stephen Fry for the eminently modern crime of blasphemy. Fry, whose previous visits to Ireland include a good-spirited turn as an English tourist in the Irish-language soap Ros na Rún, made a 2015 appearance on RTÉ’s religion programme The Meaning of Life. Fry, we might have noticed, tends to speak his mind, and on this …

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Unionists need to remember the Irish Language is cultural, not political…

In light of recent political events, it’s good every once in a while, to pause and take stock, assess where we are; where we’ve come from and the future direction, if any. This can be said of both Unionism and Nationalism, both sides of the Brexit argument and even those who spend their political lives perennially sitting on the fence. Colum Eastwood’s ‘cross-community anti-Brexit axis’ was a novel and clever attempt to forge new ground. In doing so, it left …

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Sinn Fein’s tactical playbook does not include what to do if unionists play generous and smart

So Brexit, eh?  How’s that going for you? Will it affect your vote? Or is it business as usual? Signs are from England that since it is still impossible to define what Brexit looks like the strong Remain position the Lib Dems took isn’t paying off well for them. In Scotland, the whole thing is being run aggressively as an anti-SNP/anti-#ScotRef referendum. The SNP is protected by the ongoing weakness of Scottish Labour, yet those who predicted the Tories were …

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For Brexit, British and Irish citizens’ rights are not yet guaranteed. Interchangeable rights for all should be the aim

The issue of reciprocal citizenship rights after Brexit is turning out to be more complicated than at first thought. It extends well beyond confirming the status quo to embrace work and pension rights for new immigrants from the EU as well as the 3 million existing residents.  Even when an EU citizen’s rights in the UK are backed up by taking out British citizenship, everything is not quite the same as before – as in the case of the dual …

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Can Sinn Fein tell us if the EU protects workers rights or not?

On May Day Sinn Fein were pontificating on workers rights along side their anti Brexit rhetoric,it is worth remembering: In the book Identity in Northern Ireland: Communities, Politics and Change by Cathal McCall, my own MP for Mid Ulster, Francie Molloy, states “We wouldn’t be happy with.. a United States of Europe..Irish identity would be lost” and that “a fully integrated EU would be to the detriment of vital resources of the Irish identity (Mitchell McGlaughlin discounts a fully integrated EU in …

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Fianna Fail must not make the same mistake with Bertie, that Labour have with Blair

1st May 2017, marked the 20th anniversary of the election of Tony Blair as British Prime Minister. For the current Labour Leadership, a huge part of their existence is owed to a repudiation of the Blair years with its mix of missed opportunities and misadventures such as the War in Iraq. Fianna Fail and Ireland face another anniversary over the coming weeks as the 6th June marks the 20th anniversary of the 1997 General Election which brought Bertie Ahern to …

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Theresa May’s local victories are good for the Union cause but give no comfort to special status fans

  A note of caution is needed about  talk of a Tory landslide on 8 June. Although UKIP was obliterated in the GB local elections,  Labour might have done even worse. Michael Thrasher’s projections of the local results to the general election “ for a bit of fun” on Sky News   works out a majority of  48 seats, up a respectable 36 but well short of a landslide and barely worth  the trouble of calling a snap election. John Curtice, election …

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The fault lies in ourselves, not just the politicians

Slagging off politicians is so often the default of Slugger comment, sometimes  down to  the level of that useful word “trolling,”   which  for me recalls the fate of the troll in “ The three billy goats gruff,” when the troll richly  deserves to  get crushed to bits. It ought to occur to people by now that life demands a bit more than a bilious attack, a rant or a sprint down a favourite cul de sac. Hand on heart  I …

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“Brexit has become a central question in the identity conversation and that is dangerous”

In a commentary  “Brexit and Northern Ireland” on the EPC discussion paper( see below) the  legal academic Chris McCrudden  asserts the primacy  of the Brexit question and laments the  “ tone deafness” of the UK government to  Northern Ireland’s interests. But while he rightly sees the need to set priorities in the interparty talks, he doesn’t discuss here the reasons given for SF’s withdrawal from the Assembly such as an Irish Language Act and the legacy and other  issues  SF insist …

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The European Economic Area is looking more attractive as a Brexit solution but it aint perfect

It’s going to be a long haul. Perhaps we shouldn’t pay too much attention to the megaphone diplomacy – Junker’s claim that May was living in another galaxy, May accusing unnamed Commission bureaucrats of interfering in the British election. But it isn’t a good start. On balance May has come off slightly worse in early reactions without doing her any harm at all in the court of public opinion. Attention is turning back to an outcome that was  identified almost …

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Irish Brexit paper reveals the EU will likely seek to shackle the UK

The Irish government have just published their Brexit paper entitled “Ireland and the negotiations on the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union – The Government’s Approach”. It makes interesting reading. Notably as predicted – the Common Travel Area will more than likely be retained with the paper stating the CTA is not dependent on EU membership and that there is “no obvious legal barrier” to maintaining the CTA bilaterally. The EU Brexit negotiation guidelines effectively accepting the Common Travel Area will …

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Trading Partners Wanted: Looking at Canada

As it stands, Ireland’s largest trading partner is the United Kingdom. This has been the case since Independence although the balance has shifted greatly since Ireland entered the EEC in 1973 with the UK no longer wholly dominant although our reliance for trade with the UK continues in certain sectors such as beef, timber, pork and much more. As Ireland’s reliance on the UK as a trading partner has diminished, it has been able to look to a wider market …

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On Brexit, the Irish are caught between two opposing forces, but at least they’re showing more invention and concern about the North than the British and northerners themselves

The ritual opening shots in the Brexit campaign must leave the Republic feeling caught in a trap in a dialogue of the deaf between two opposing forces. So much, so sadly predictable, in spite of all the warm words- although the crudeness of the exchanges is perhaps surprising. It’s pretty clear that the Irish government don’t favour the aggressive opening approach by the Commission and confirmed this morning by its chief negotiator Michel Barnier. On the detail of the FT’s …

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