Biden heads to Northern Ireland to mark Good Friday Agreement anniversary

US President Joe Biden arrived in Belfast on Tuesday at a politically fraught time in Northern Ireland as he helped mark the 25th anniversary of a peace deal that largely ended 30 years of bloodshed there.

Biden must be careful as pro-British trade unions loyal to London continue to boycott the power-sharing government that was a fundamental part of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. protests over post-Brexit trade rules without further changes to the deal struck by Britain and the European Union in February to reduce trade barriers.

The DUP said Biden’s visit – the first by a US president in 10 years – would not force an end to the protests.

Biden is expected to meet representatives of five Northern Ireland parties before his speech at Ulster University but does not plan to force them, a senior administration official said.

“The President will have the opportunity to engage with political parties in Northern Ireland before his speech, and as we have said, he looks forward to continuing to engage with them as we work to improve the lives and livelihoods of all communities there,” he said. said John Kirby, White House national security spokesman.

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Biden, who will float the possibility of closer investment ties between the US and Northern Ireland in an attempt to encourage an end to bankruptcy, clashed with the British government at the time of Brexit negotiations, drawing a rebuke from the DUP.

“I think the president is worried about the restoration [power-sharing] the executive will pave the way for the economic agenda. This will be an important dividend for the visit,” Irish Foreign Minister Micheál Martin told national broadcaster RTE.

Legislative impasse, sporadic violence

Biden, who will meet British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak when he arrives on Tuesday and deliver a speech at the University of Ulster in Belfast on Wednesday, will use the trip to stress the United States’ readiness to support Northern Ireland’s “huge economic potential”. House said last week.

However, the latest political stalemate is set to overshadow the visit and the anniversary of the US peace agreement helped broker between Irish nationalists seeking Irish unity and pro-British trade unions who want to remain part of the UK.

More than 3,600 people had been killed in the previous 30 years, mostly by paramilitary groups on both sides such as the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and pro-British Protestant groups commonly known as “loyalists”.

A number of people were also killed by the British army – which was deployed in 1969 and was the target of attacks by the IRA and other republican groups – and local security forces.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Irish counterpart Bertie Ahern joined participants in Stormont during the final days of the 1998 negotiations, led by US Senator George Mitchell, sent by president Bill Clinton.

There was still sporadic violence by small groups opposed to peace and police were attacked with petrol bombs at an anti-agreement parade in Londonderry, also known as Derry, on Monday.

Britain’s MI5 intelligence agency recently raised the threat level in Northern Ireland from domestic terrorism from “substantial” to “severe” – meaning an attack is likely.

Biden has Irish ancestry on both his mother’s and father’s sides and often quotes Irish poets such as Seamus Heaney. He will spend three days in Ireland where he will address Parliament in Dublin and visit his ancestral home on one of the coasts.

He will meet a distant cousin in County Louth on Wednesday and give a public address in the west county of Mayo, where his great-grandfather Edward Blewitt grew up, before leaving on Saturday.

“Since [John F.] Kennedy has never had an Irish American president like Joe Biden and we look forward to welcoming him home,” Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said on Sunday.