Throughout his political career, Joe Biden he has been shaping his public image around his Irish roots. Her mother’s ancestors – the Finnegans of County Louth and the Bleweits of County Mayo – they were 100% irish. “The BBC? I’m Irish,” she responded with humor (and pride) a few years ago to a journalist who asked her for “a quick comment” for the British channel.
For this reason, when this Tuesday Biden lands in Belfast – where British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is expected to receive him – will do so as the US President more irish since John F. Kennedy, also a Catholic and of similar descent. The president will thus begin his four day tour by Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Peace Agreement that ended three decades of armed conflict on the island.
However, the celebration of that ceasefire that was sealed on April 10, 1998 between unionist Protestants and Republican Catholics (with the mediation of the Bill Clinton Administration) has been marred by altercations and threats about a possible terrorist attack during Biden’s visit. In fact, last Monday nightlaughs masked people attacked a police vehicle with gasoline pumps and other objects during a demonstration against the peace accords in Londonderry. A reminder that the violence, half a century later, it still rocks Ulster.
US President Joe Biden attends the White House Easter Egg Roll, in Washington, US on April 10, 2023.
Last week, the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) already warned that a group of dissident republicans could cause disturbances in the days before the Easter celebrations. On Sunday the warning was about to come true: the authorities thwarted “a mortar attack”, according to police sources.
Specifically, the daily The Belfast Telegraph He explained that it was bomb squads from the British army who found material to make explosives in Derry, the second city in Northern Ireland and one of the hardest hit during the troubles (term used euphemistically to refer to the armed struggle), which left more than 3,500 dead at the end of the last century.
According to the authorities, behind this attempted attack is the New IRA, a paramilitary organization formed in 2012 as a result of the already inactive Irish Republican Army (IRA) which does not accept the ceasefire, demands the reunification of Ireland and its full independence from the UK.
political turmoil
The information about a possible boycott of Biden, who after giving a speech on Wednesday at the University of Ulster will travel to Dublin, comes from the British intelligence services (MI5), which just a few days ago raised Northern Ireland terror alert at highest level. “The public must remain vigilant, but not alarmed, and continue to report any concerns they have,” Chris Heaton-Harris, Britain’s minister for Northern Ireland, said in a written statement.
Unionists against the Good Friday Agreements in Londonderry.
The decision to go from “substantial” to “serious” threat (the highest category since 2010) not only responds to the increase in security measures for the commemoration of the Good Friday Agreements: it comes after a series of attacks on police officers. Without going any further, last February two masked men shot the officer, John Caldwell, who was seriously injured while coaching a children’s soccer team in the town of Omagh, about 100 kilometers from Belfast.
Northern Ireland is also in a difficult political situation. He brexit and its consequences, such as bureaucratic problems in customs controls, have revived tensions in the area. The territory, in fact, He has been without an Executive for a year. The nationalists of Sinn Fein achieved a historic victory in the last regional elections of 2022 by becoming, for the first time, the party with the most votes.
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However, the Good Friday Agreement forces Catholics and Protestants to govern in coalition and the unionists of the Ulster Democratic Party (DUP) refuse to form a “power-sharing” government. In exchange for unblocking the situation, they demand a total legislative break from the community bloc, for which they refuse to accept the Windsor Agreement recently sealed by the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyenand the Sunak Government to reduce friction caused by the controversial Irish Protocol.
