Brexit ‘an aberration’ in bid for NI peace

BELFAST: Brexit should be just an “aberration” in the bid to strengthen Northern Ireland’s peace process, US congresswoman Nancy Pelosi has said.

The US House of Representatives speaker visited the Irish border which has become a stumbling block to the UK’s EU withdrawal. She was greeted by anti-Brexit campaigners during her short stop at the frontier on Thursday morning.

The senior Democrat from California said the US had a vested interest in peace in Northern Ireland which was sealed by the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. She said: “We have said that we are guarantors for the Good Friday Agreement because we believe it is fair to both sides — that is why they agreed to it. We believe that Brexit should be just an aberration in this discussion as we continue to build and strengthen our peace that was generated by the Good Friday accord.” Pelosi repeated her assertion that the peace process was a “beacon to the world” and a model for reconciliation. She said: “Far be it for any of us to want that beacon’s lustre to be dimmed by anything that the Brexit conversation could bring down on the Good Friday accord.”

The congresswoman walked across a “peace bridge” over the River Foyle in Londonderry. The span was built using EU funds and links primarily nationalist and primarily unionist communities on either river bank. Pelosi said her border visit was made out of respect for the courage of those who participated in the Good Friday accord.

The US Consulate General in Belfast was established on May 27 1796, by the first American president, George Washington, and is the second oldest continuously operating US consulate in the world. Pelosi visited Belfast with her daughter more than two decades ago and recalled: “The difference between what we went through then and what we saw in terms of tanks and barbed wire. It is about peace, it is about not just what it means to Northern Ireland and Ireland, that would be reason enough for us to be guarantors.”

She expressed pride in the peace process role of president Bill Clinton and talks chairman senator George Mitchell as well as senior congressman Richard Neal. “What it means to the world to have this example of reconciliation, really ending hundreds of years of conflict, recent thousands of deaths.”

She has repeatedly railed against the prospect of a hard Irish border during her tour of Ireland with congressional colleagues. Earlier this week she warned that US trade talks with the UK could be endangered if the agreement which largely ended decades of violence was compromised.

Dermot O’Hara, a spokesman for Border Communities Against Brexit, greeted her at the frontier. He said: “She is saying to the British very clearly that they must respect the Good Friday Agreement, the Good Friday Agreement underwrote the Irish situation here. This is a British border here, we want the border to be in the Irish Sea and we appreciate the visit by the delegation and their support for the rights of the Irish people.”

John Boyle, mayor of Derry City and Strabane Council, said it was evident Pelosi was determined to protect the integrity of the agreement.