How an “amazing” blunder created a dangerous confrontation with Brexit

Photographer: Paul Faith / Bloomberg

Thirty years ago, during the long-running sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland, gunmen tried to assassinate a young academic in Belfast.

Adrian Guelke survived, still lives in the city and, last week, watched in amazement as the European Union raised tensions that nearly cost him his life by threatening the part of the Brexit agreement aimed at protecting the fragile peace in the region.

Now a professor emeritus of politics at Queen’s University Belfast, Guelke described the bloc’s threat to control the flow of coronavirus vaccines in Northern Ireland as a “stunning” blunder.

“Pandora’s box has been opened,” he said in a telephone interview.

The EU may have withdrawn, but it has allowed the unionists in Northern Ireland, who want to remain part of the United Kingdom, to revive a separate and much larger controversy that Brexit should have settled once and for all: border with mainland Britain.

The line threatens not only to sour the EU’s fragile post-Brexit relationship with Britain, but also to become a hotbed for unionists’ hot dissatisfaction with the agreement signed by Boris Johnson despite their opposition.

Biden Warning

While there are few signs that the crisis will immediately rekindle the growing conflict between Protestant unionists in Northern Ireland, minority Catholic nationalists, who want it to be united with the Republic of Ireland and British troops, history shows how events from the province can quickly get out of control.

How Johnson, the EU and Northern Ireland trade unionists respond in the coming days and months could tip the balance. US President Joe Biden has already warned that the peace process in Northern Ireland must be protected.

“There are undoubtedly people running to see an opportunity to resume paramilitary activity,” said Reg Empey, a former leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. “One crazy person is needed.”

Read more: How the Brexit transaction tries to solve the Irish border problem: QuickTake

Unlike the rest of the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland remained effectively in the EU customs union and in the single market after Brexit – a crucial concession Johnson made to the bloc to ensure the orderly departure of Britain.

By keeping the land border with Ireland out of checkpoints, both sides hoped to prevent a return to the Age of Trouble. But it came at a price: goods arriving from the rest of the United Kingdom would be subject to additional checks and documents as they crossed the Irish Sea from mainland Britain.

Delays at the border

The Democratic Unionist Party, the largest political party in Northern Ireland, opposed the so-called Protocol, treating the province differently from the rest of the UK, but had to deal with the consequences: delays and border disruptions, which are proving unpopular with voters.

Retailers such as John Lewis stopped selling to the region. Marks & Spencer Group Plc has withdrawn about 300 of its products from its Northern Ireland stores, and images of empty food shelves have flooded social media.

Under increasing pressure from even tougher loyalists, the DUP had already pushed the British prime minister to drop the protocol. Johnson initially eliminated the DUP, dismissing delays and omissions as tooth problems.

Blindsided

All this changed late on 29 January, when Northern Ireland was caught in the EU vaccine crisis. Suddenly, the block raised – however weak – the prospect of returning to the 500-kilometer border from near Derry in the north to Dundalk in the south.

“They removed the carpet from the defenders of the Protocol,” said Guelke, who was shot by loyal paramilitaries who mistakenly believed he had ties to the Irish Republican movement.

Officials in London were blinded. One who knows the situation was horrified that the EU did not appreciate the sensitivities surrounding the protocol and the peace it was designed to protect.

The next day, ministers, including Cabinet Michael Gove and Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis, held crisis talks with Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney. During the video call, they agreed that they needed an emergency meeting with the EU to address the dangers of the Commission’s actions. Meanwhile, ministers have downplayed the situation in public.

Johnson Threat

On Wednesday, Johnson was confronted in Parliament by a DUP member who asked him to prove his commitment to UK. The prime minister has threatened to suspend parts of the Brexit deal in the same way the EU did, if needed to end controls on goods crossing the Irish Sea.

That evening, Gove, Lewis and DUP leaders, as well as their political opponents Sinn Fein, referred their cases directly to Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic.

The conversation, in another Zoom call, was described as live by someone familiar with the issue. Gove called for the EU’s delay to implement full controls on food, medicine and parcels by 2023 to help alleviate border delays – but Sefcovic protested.

Based on this meeting, British officials say they doubt whether the Commission really understands the extent to which it is playing fire in Northern Ireland.

“Dangerous place”

Privately, EU officials, who freely grant the bloc, have made a bad mistake, suspecting that Johnson is using the vaccine crisis as an opportunity to win concessions on the operation of the protocol. Few expect him to try to give up the business directly.

There are also tensions from the British. While the Unionists want the entire protocol removed, Johnson and his team have not given the EU a deadline to comply with the UK’s demands. They simply want the bloc to take seriously the need to address protocol and issues the hope the turn over vaccines will serve as a wake-up call in Brussels. That can disappoint DUP.

“We are in a dangerous place right now,” said Edward Burke, an assistant professor of international relations at the University of Nottingham, who is researching the effect of Brexit on the British-Irish security relationship.

“Unionists and loyalists do not sense as if London or Dublin were listening to their concerns, ”he said. “And the model in Northern Ireland in recent decades is, unfortunately, that violence or the threat of violence is gaining the attention and money of both governments.”

“Threatening behavior”

Days after the EU’s wrong move, local and European authorities withdrew their inspectors from the ports of Larne and Belfast after the local municipality said it was “an increase in sinister and threatening behavior”.

However, the police point out that there is no evidence that loyal organized paramilitary groups are behind these threats and remain unconvinced about how serious to take them.

The risk is that events in Northern Ireland have a habit of escalating. In 2013, for example, a decision by Belfast City Hall to stop the hoisting of the British flag fueled unrest which was then amplified by the annual marches of Protestant groups. This triggered the worst sectarian violence in the 1990s, paralyzing Belfast for much of that summer.

“If it weren’t for the pandemic, I think we would see major demonstrations here,” Empey said. “The Brussels movement last week – I couldn’t tell you how serious a mistake it was.”

– With the assistance of Kitty Donaldson and Ian Wishart