MADRID, 15 May. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, has urged the parliamentarians of Northern Ireland to resolve the blockade in which the Northern Irish Lower House has been installed to “go back to work”, while he resolves the blockade with Brussels on the trade agreements after Brexit.
“Northern Ireland’s power-sharing institutions need to get back on track so they can begin to tackle the issues that matter to the people of Northern Ireland,” Downing Street said in a statement issued on Sunday.
Thus, Johnson wants to convey a “tough message” in private meetings on his first visit to Belfast since the Assembly elections, so the UK Government should guarantee its role in ensuring political stability in its own country.
For its part, the Irish nationalist party Sinn Féin, winner of the recent elections in Northern Ireland, has reproached the Government of the British Prime Minister for its alleged support for the political blockade led by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP, for its acronym in English) which prevents Northern Ireland’s self-government from being retaken.
The DUP has prevented the election of a new president to the Northern Ireland Assembly to try to force changes to the Brexit Protocol on Northern Ireland which unionists say means the effective customs separation of Northern Ireland from Great Britain.
Johnson “is in cahoots with the DUP” to make it difficult to form a government in Northern Ireland, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said on Saturday. The PM is “recklessly and cynically” supporting the DUP in a “calculated game” over the Brexit Protocol.
“The DUP has not only prevented the formation of a government, but also tries to veto the operation of the Assembly. It is outrageous,” added McDonald. “And the British government has helped the DUP in this blocking tactic. They must desist and when we meet Boris Johnson on Monday we will make that very clear to them,” she stressed.
In addition, he has warned of the “danger” that London takes a unilateral decision on the Protocol. “We are going to make it clear that the Protocol is not going to disappear. It is necessary for the Brexit that the Conservative Party and the DUP defended to work,” she explained. “The British Government cannot use Ireland as a pawn. We are not going to be collateral damage in the Brexit negotiations,” he stressed.
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