Biden urges N.Ireland leaders to seize ‘incredible economic opportunity’
BELFAST, (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden urged Northern Irish political leaders to restore their power-sharing government with the promise that scores of major U.S. corporations were ready to invest in the region as he marked the 25th anniversary of peace in Belfast.
Biden, who is fiercely proud of his Irish heritage, spent just over half a day in the UK region - where he met British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak - before leaving for the Irish Republic for two-and-a-half days of speeches and meetings with officials and distant relatives.
The brief Belfast stop was against the backdrop of the latest political stalemate in which the devolved power-sharing government, a key part of the 1998 peace deal, has not met for more than a year due to a dispute about post-Brexit trade arrangements.
“It took long, hard years of work to get to this place,” Biden said in a speech at the new Ulster University campus in Belfast, remarking how the city had been transformed since he first travelled there as a young senator.
“Today’s Belfast is the beating heart of Northern Ireland and is poised to drive unprecedented economic opportunity. There are scores of major American corporations wanting to come here wanting to invest.”
The 1998 peace accord was backed by the U.S. and largely ended 30 years of bloodshed between mainly Roman Catholic nationalist opponents and mainly Protestant unionist supporters of British rule. But political progress has been held back by a series of disputes, most recently over how Britain’s departure from the European Union affects the border with EU member Ireland.
Biden said power-sharing remained critical to the future of Northern Ireland and that an effective devolved government would “draw even greater opportunity in this region”.
“So I hope the assembly and the executive will soon be restored. That’s a judgment for you to make, not me, but I hope it happens,” he told an audience that included the leaders of Northern Ireland’s five main political parties.
Biden said the recent Windsor Framework deal between the European Union and Britain to ease post-Brexit trade barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom offered the stability and predictability to encourage greater
investment.
That deal has so far failed to convince the region’s largest proBritish party, the Democratic
Unionist Party (DUP), to end a boycott of the local assembly. Power-sharing has endured mul
tiple breakdowns and suspensions since 1998.
DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson said Biden’s visit - the first to the region by a U.S. president in 10 years - did not change the political dynamic around his party’s protest against the trade rules that treat the province differently to the rest of the UK.
The DUP wants further changes around the UK/EU deal and will put proposals to the British government within the next few weeks, Donaldson said. London has said the deal cannot be renegotiated.
Donaldson, who like other local leaders had a short one-on-one meeting with Biden, said the president made clear that he was not in Belfast to interfere and that his speech “was much more balanced than we have heard perhaps in the past”.