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Dashed Hopes in Northern Ireland
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11517 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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10 / 1986 |
3,056 Words |
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John McEntee
John McEntee is the London correspondent for the Irish Press
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It is now almost a year since Irish Premier Garret FitzGerald and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher signed their names to the Anglo-Irish Accord. In the 11 months since they ratified the agreement in the pretty Northern Ireland village of Hillsborough, County Down, the high hopes that it would provide a framework for an end to the ongoing tragedy of Ulster have been dashed, partly as a consequence of British timidity in the face of Unionist backlash against the accord.
As the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) continues its lethal campaign of bombing and shooting, as Protestant murder gangs carry out sectarian assassinations of innocent Catholics, the politicians in London, Dublin, and Belfast flounder around, seemingly unable to find a way out of the morass. Against a background of sustained and unrelenting opposition from the majority Protestant community, the British government has faltered in its implementation of the accord. Promised concessions to the minority Nationalist population have been delayed.
Furthermore, the minority coalition government in Dublin headed by FitzGerlad's Fine Gael Party is expected to lose the forthcoming general election (to be held before November 1987). The Fianna Fail Party, led by Charles Haughey, is tipped to form the next administration and has pledged to overhaul the agreement.
In London, Thatcher is preoccupied with matters other than Anglo-Irish affairs. The once unassailable Iron Lady is beset by more immediate problems. Her handling of the South African sanctions issue is now recognized to have greatly weakened her prestige. There are indications that a substantial portion of her Tory Party would like her removed before the next election. Thus the woman who engineered a colonial solution to the Rhodesian problem, then brought the Argentineans and the striking miners to heel, is not in a position to bring her full powers to bear on the age-old Irish question.
'Taking on' the Unionists
This summer was to have been the one where Thatcher "took on" the Unionists. She was determined to bring the Reverend Ian Paisley and his supporters to heel. She wanted to go down in history as the British leader who had succeeded where others like Gladstone, Asquith, and Lloyd George had failed.
British official insisted that the most important criterion by which the Anglo-Irish Accord should be
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