Northern Ireland is no one's backstop

The treatment of Northern Ireland in the context of the negotiations between the EU and the UK has shown the inconsistency of the EU’s position with regard to nationalism.

The EU rightly condemned Crimea’s secession from Ukraine and reunification with Russia. This was not so much because the referendum that led to this secession was held under dubious circumstances. Crimean secession would have been condemned even if the vote had been completely free and fair. The reason is that Crimea is a part of a sovereign nation state called Ukraine and parts of sovereign nation states may not legally secede without permission.

This position was reiterated with regard to Catalonia. It simply did not matter whether a majority in Catalonia wanted independence or whether they didn’t. So long as Spain refuses to allow a legal referendum on independence and refuses to recognise the right of Catalonians to create a sovereign nation state, then Catalonia will remain legally a part of Spain.

There are similar examples all over the world. The right of a sovereign nation state to maintain its territorial integrity is insurmountable so long as it does not oppress or attack the people living in part of its territory. It was only because Serbia attacked the people in Kosovo that international opinion was willing to make an exception and grant the right of Kosovo to become independent.

International opinion has also favoured the right of colonies to become independent, but it is important to recognise what is and what is not a colony. Argentina was a Spanish colony. Catalonia is not a Spanish colony. If you really can’t see the difference, you might benefit from a pair of glasses. If Catalonia were to be described as a colony, then half of Europe would have a colonial relationship to the other half.  

The peculiar thing about Northern Ireland then is that the EU is unwilling to treat it in the same way as it treated Catalonia and Crimea. Northern Ireland is not a colony. Some Irish nationalists, thereby making the case for Ulster unionism, still speak of the people of Northern Ireland as settlers having been planted there. But if we treat everyone whose ancestors moved somewhere in the fifteenth century as illegitimate colonists then we are liable to end up thinking that virtually the whole population of the United States of America has no right to live where they do.

Northern Ireland is an integral part of the sovereign nation state called the United Kingdom. The Republic of Ireland has no more legitimate claim to a part of that nation state than Russia has a claim to Crimea. It simply does not matter that Crimea was once a part of Russia. Nor does it matter if the majority of the population of Crimea think of themselves as Russian, speak Russian and would like to secede from Ukraine. Crimean secession would be illegal even if all these things were true. It is for this reason that nearly the whole world continues to protest against Russia’s annexation of the territory of a neighbouring state.

But this argument obviously ought to apply equally to Northern Ireland. When the 26 counties chose to secede from the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland remained. It indeed has never left the United Kingdom. Secession doesn’t give you the right to claim someone else’s territory, otherwise the Confederacy if it had won would have had the right to claim New York. For this reason the Republic of Ireland has no more claim on the territory of the United Kingdom than does Russia with regard to the territory of Ukraine. Indeed it has less for Northern Ireland was never part of a sovereign nation state called the Republic of Ireland.

There are various treaties that exist between the UK and Ireland, which allow both the people of Northern Ireland and the people of the Republic to hold votes regarding Northern Ireland’s status, but the UK as a sovereign nation state can choose to renounce or renegotiate any treaty that it pleases. Lots of historical treaties have become obsolete, have been broken, or simply no longer apply.  The UK therefore could decide that such treaties that currently exist between itself and Ireland were obtained by coercion as a result of terrorism and were therefore inconsistent with the British Government’s longstanding policy of not appeasing terrorists.

It could also argue that the Irish Government has used the existence of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement to hinder British foreign policy (Brexit) and that the Irish Government is using this agreement to further its policy of gradually annexing Northern Ireland.

The purpose of the Irish backstop is to put Northern Ireland into the Republic’s sphere of influence and to show that while the border between the Republic and Northern Ireland is seamless the border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain may become real. Checks may be required. British goods and citizens may in effect be moving from the non-EU to the EU when they travel from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

Could such a border exist between Catalonia and the rest of Spain? Obviously not. Spain would not accept it, because it would encourage Catalan secession. Would any other sovereign nation state in the EU accept such a regulatory border? No. This is the sort of thing that a sovereign nation state goes to war to prevent happening. If you don’t fight for your territorial integrity, what do you fight for?

No-one is going to impose a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. The British are not going to do it, nor are the Irish, nor are the EU. But the Irish Republic has used this non-issue to further its irredentist and quite illegitimate claim to Northern Ireland and it has done so with the backing of the EU. This alone must be grounds for the UK Government reviewing the Belfast Agreement. It is quite intolerable that, backed by terrorist threats, the Irish Government seeks to move towards a position where it can call for a referendum on Irish unification. This is no better than Russia using military force to win a referendum in order to justify its claim to Crimea.

It is time for the UK, just like Spain and Ukraine and indeed the vast majority of states in the world, to assert that our territory is indivisible. Secession and annexation is no more legitimate a foreign policy goal in Ireland than it is Ukraine. The Republic of Ireland has no more claim to the territory of another sovereign nation state than does Haiti have a claim to the Dominican Republic.  The mere fact that you share an island does not allow you to steal another person’s home.

The EU’s hypocrisy on this issue is dangerous for stability in Europe. In attempting to punish Britain by furthering the aims of Irish nationalism it will encourage such nationalism elsewhere in Europe. Why shouldn’t Russia seek to reunify what was once “All the Russias” including parts of what is now the EU such as Poland and the Baltic States. If reunification is a morally worthy goal for Ireland, why not for Austria, Russia or dare I say it, Germany. No doubt Austrian, German and Russian nationalists would be delighted to go back to their 1914 borders.

With friends like these

I spent my childhood watching reports from Northern Ireland about bombings, punishment beating and prisoners on hunger strike. Most nights the BBC news would have something about some latest horror. The people living in Northern Ireland suffered more than anyone else. It didn’t matter who you were. There was the daily possibility of being killed or maimed by someone who wanted to solve a political issue using violence.

I remember that there was some fear that the conflict might spread to Scotland. After all quite a large number of people in various parts of Scotland sympathised with the aims of the IRA. But for the most part we observed from far away.

Every now and again we discovered that the IRA had spread to Guildford or Brighton or Manchester, but we never had the day to day fear that people must have felt in Belfast.

I remember in the end becoming rather immune to the whole thing. I took it for granted that these things would happen every now and again. I barely paid attention. A routine developed. Politicians would condemn using a set formula of words and then we all just waited for the next bombing. Even in Northern Ireland the chances of being killed or wounded were small. In other parts of the UK they were very small indeed. The IRA were like a disease that was hard to catch, but impossible to cure. There wasn’t any point worrying about them.

And then it ended. Who won?

I’d like to think Northern Ireland won. The situation isn’t perfect, but it’s a lot better than it was. Northern Ireland rarely appears on the BBC news anymore and if it does, the story, for the most part, is the same sort of story that might be told in any other part of the UK. One or other of the Northern Irish political parties is arguing about something. There has been some particularly bad weather or there has been some sort of accident. Sometimes there is even good news.  

We made peace. It’s not perfect, but it has more or less lasted since 1997. The thing with peace that is always tricky is that you have to make it with your enemy. There is no point trying to make it with anyone else. But this, of course, meant that British politicians didn’t quite mean what they said when they stated so often that they would never negotiate with terrorists. We did negotiate with them, then we set them free and then we allowed them to become elected politicians. We also had to make concessions. The IRA gave up their campaign of violence. The British in return gave them the Belfast Agreement (1998) commonly known as the Good Friday Agreement. It was right that we did so, but let’s not pretend. It was the reward that the IRA got for their decades of bombing. The British signed the agreement so that this bombing would stop for ever.

There is therefore something very dubious about using this agreement years later to try to gain a political advantage. But suddenly ever since the UK’s vote to leave the EU in 2016 I kept hearing various people going on about the Good Friday Agreement. The phrase had almost dropped from my memory. What on earth had that to do with Brexit?

Over time it became clear. The EU and the Irish Government wanted to use the Belfast Agreement as a way to put pressure on the British Government. This immediately struck me as quite outrageous. How dare they use a peace treaty that we signed so that the UK could avoid terrorist attacks to gain an advantage in the Brexit negotiations? Were these to be the fruits of the long IRA bombing campaign? Did the Republic of Ireland really want to inch closer to a united Ireland because Britain naturally didn’t want any more of our people to be killed by Irish terrorists? I thought this stank morally. But then far too many of those who wanted a united Ireland were always willing to sympathise with the aims of the IRA even if they sometime tut tutted at their methods.

I kept hearing from Remain supporters in the UK and from people in the Republic of Ireland that the Belfast Agreement forbade there being a hard border in Ireland and that it meant that it limited the UK’s room for manoeuvre in leaving the EU. This kept being repeated so often that it became a sort of orthodoxy. It’s also complete and utter nonsense.

I have never read so much interpretation about a document that demonstrates so ably that the interpreters have never in fact read it.

The Belfast Agreement is quite an easy read, though it is rather dull. It can be found here.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-belfast-agreement

What is it about?

Firstly it states that both the UK and the Republic of Ireland accept that the status of Northern Ireland must be determined democratically. The people who will determine that future are those living in Northern Ireland. So if Northern Ireland were ever to unite with the Republic this could only happen after a vote.

There is next a section on setting up an assembly in Northern Ireland, then a section on setting up a North/South Ministerial Council and also a section on setting up a British Irish Council. There is quite a lot about human rights, cross border cooperation, reconciliation, decommissioning and prisoners but not once is there any mention about border controls. The actual border between Northern Ireland and the Republic or its status in fact is not mentioned at all.

Even in the section dealing with “Economic, social and cultural issues” there is not a thing about trade between Northern Ireland and the Republic. There is no mention of customs, or duties. In fact none of the things that have been debated endlessly about the border between the Republic and Northern Ireland are anywhere mentioned in the Belfast Agreement.

The only limit to the UK’s sovereignty with regard to Northern Ireland is that we have promised to allow the Northern Irish people to decide if they wish to stay in the UK or join the Republic. Until that point we would be free to build a wall and dig a moat. The Republic of Ireland has no more right to demand that the border be kept open than any other nation state has that right.

The UK knows that most people in Northern Ireland want an open border. It is convenient and it is far better than neighbouring countries have friendly relations and open borders. For this reason we have promised to keep the border open.

But the Belfast Agreement in no way limits Brexit. It in no way changes the fact that the border in Ireland is an international border. If as a consequence of its EU membership the Republic of Ireland finds it impossible to remain in the Common Travel Area or if it finds itself forced to collect tariffs and regulate the movement of people, then that is a problem for the Republic not for us.  It could be resolved by deciding to leave the EU also.  But that is an issue for the Republic. It is not the UK’s business.

There is nothing in the Belfast Agreement to prevent friendly relations between the UK and the Republic of Ireland continuing after Brexit. The various councils and cross border cooperation would continue even if the border were manned. After all prior to Schengen almost everywhere in the EU had a manned borders. Owing to the crisis over migration there are quite a few manned borders springing up again in the EU. But these countries still cooperate and are friendly and trade freely with each other.

It becomes ever more obvious that the EU and the Irish Republic are attempting to use Brexit to bring about a united Ireland. This is why they continually wish to treat Northern Ireland differently from the other parts of the UK and why they want a border to run through the Irish Sea. So what the IRA couldn’t achieve by bombs the EU and the Irish Republic wish to achieve by means of issues they pretend are contained in the Belfast Agreement. Meanwhile the Remainers cheer them on. With friends like these who needs terrorists?