Northern Ireland protests raise specter of return to troubles

Saeed Pourreza

Press TV, London

Northern Ireland is bracing itself for more potential trouble. Peaceful pop-up protests across the region in the coming days; an opportunity, some say to catch police by surprise and block major roads for a time.

They follow days of riots and violent clashes earlier this month that plunged the city of Belfast and parts of Northern Ireland into a crisis not seen since the dark days of the troubles that started in the late 1960s and led to nearly three decades of bloodshed.

Tension have been rising since Brexit, which many warned threaten the Good Friday agreement of 1998 that put an end to the conflict. Most contentious of all is the implementation of the Northern Ireland protocol which allowed the UK to leave the EU without setting up a border on the island of Ireland.

Instead, the UK and EU agreed to a customs border between Britain and Northern Ireland. Now the Loyalist and Unionist communities who wish to remain under British rule are demanding the protocol to be scrapped altogether.

The riots were also fueled by the country’s police chief’s refusal to resign after a decision not to prosecute Sinn Fein politicians for attending a large funeral last year against Covid restrictions.

Efforts are underway to settle tensions politically including a call from the US president for all sides to resort to dialogue. But concerns of more unrest and violence are in the air.

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