ReportageThe agreement negotiated by Boris Johnson with the EU provides for customs control between the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, much to the chagrin of Unionists who cry treason. A century after the separation of 1921, the Brexit raises the specter of violence as that of the reunification of the two territories.
While there are fears that Northern Ireland will re-enact inter-communal struggles, many believe that Brexit could put back on the table the idea of reunification of Ireland, a century after the 1921 split. consider chaos, others a historic turning point, and still others the status quo. No one, in truth, knows what will become of this still convalescent land of three decades of conflict (1969-1998), precipitated in the unknown by the British decision, in the 2016 referendum, to leave the Union. European Union (EU).
" It is complicated… " Laurence McKeown drinks a sip of tea and looks for her words. Met on the border between the two Irlandes, where he lives, the former prisoner and hunger striker of the IRA (Irish Republican Army), become an influential intellectual and a respected writer, has a smirk. There are two tics of language in Northern Ireland, and this playwright is no exception. The first is to begin the presentation of the political situation by: " It is complicated… " The second is, about the Brexit, to then start one sentence out of two by: " Ironically… "
"Ironically, London, the breeders and unionists of Northern Ireland have done more to advance the cause of united Ireland than decades of conflict …"
Laurence McKeown, former prisoner and hunger striker of the IRA
Laurence McKeown starts: "Ironically, London, the breeders and unionists of Northern Ireland have done more to advance the cause of united Ireland than decades of conflict …" This is the debate of the moment, from Belfast to Dublin. Did the pro-Brexit unionists shoot themselves in the foot by supporting the British Conservatives in the 2016 referendum on the European Union? Have they finally been "Betrayed" as they claim from now on, by Prime Minister Boris Johnson during the last negotiations with the EU? "The fact is that this is the first time in Irish-British history that the Unionists are not getting what they want from London, which is no longer able to grant it, think Laurence McKeown. It is also the first time that Ireland has such a strong political position, with the idea of a possible reunification spreading across the island. "
The agreement negotiated by Mr Johnson with the European Union on 17 October does not provide, as the Irish Republicans feared, a land border on the new EU border between the two territories of Ireland, but Customs control between the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, called "control in the Irish Sea" – denounced by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). Shouting at the "Treason" the DUP, which has ten seats in Westminster, has refused, although it has always supported the Conservatives and Brexit, to vote in favor of the new London-Brussels agreement.
