O’Neill: Irish unity is back on agenda due to Brexit

A FRESH election must be called if crisis talks to restore Stormont do not deliver a deal, Gerry Adams has warned.

The Sinn Fein president said another snap poll — the third in a year — was the only way to proceed in the event of negotiations not producing agreement.

The parties have been locked in talks to break the political impasse that threatens to end 10 years of devolved government in Northern Ireland. The negotiations are currently suspended for Easter.

Secretary of State James Brokenshire has said that if there is no breakthrough by “early May” he will either trigger an election or move to a return to direct rule.

Addressing an Easter Rising commemoration in Carrickmore, Co Tyrone, Mr Adams said: “Sinn Fein wants a deal. But if there is no deal then there has to be an election.”

He added: “The role and responsibility of the Irish Government must be to assert that an election is the only legal course open to the British Government if the current talks fail to elect an Executive.”

Mr Adams also warned that a change in approach was needed from the DUP.

The Irish language and legacy issues are among a range of sticking points between the parties. Last week the DUP hinted at a shift with party leader Arlene Foster pledging to meet Irish language speakers to hear their concerns.

While Sinn Fein welcomed her comments as a “positive step”, Mr Adams (right) insisted the DUP must go further.

“A new generous unionist approach will be embraced and met with flaithiulacht (generosity) from Sinn Fein and other progressives. “However, if what we have seen from the DUP in recent times continues, that will only guarantee that there will be no DUP First Minister and no return to the status quo at Stormont,”

he said.

The DUP is seeking to secure protections for Ulster-Scots speakers and has pressed for the introduction of a military covenant in Northern Ireland.

Mr Adams said seeking a “counter balance” represented a “flawed approach”.

“The DUP leader can cast about for some ‘counter balance’, some quid pro quo, to legitimate progressive measures which benefit everyone,” he added.

“She will achieve absolutely nothing but continued division if she thinks she can build a strat- egy on such a flawed approach.”

Elsewhere yesterday Sinn Fein national chairperson Declan Kearney claimed the DUP and UK Government were living in denial, and represent an anti-equality axis which has blocked progress in the Stormont talks.

He claimed that unless their position changes after the Easter break, they would be responsible for continuing the political deadlock. BREXIT has put Irish unity back on the agenda, Sinn Fein’s Stormont leader has warned.

Michelle O’Neill said the UK’s impending divorce from the EU would dramatically change Ireland’s political landscape.

Accusing the Westminster government of driving a “reckless” Brexit agenda, she said it had the potential to jeopardise the Good Friday peace accord and the island’s political and economic stability.

Her warning came as she delivered the annual oration at Glasnevin cemetery in Dublin yesterday on the 101st anniversary of the Easter Rising.

Ms O’Neill said: “The Brexit referendum result has swept away many of the previous political assumptions about the constitutional, political and economic status quo in Ireland.

“Ireland’s political landscape, north and south, will change dramatically — and this poses a severe threat to the Good Friday Agreement and the political and economic future of the island.

“This has brought the issue of Irish reunification firmly back on to the political agenda.”

Although the UK as a whole voted to leave the EU in last June’s referendum, Northern Ireland opted to remain by a majority of 56% to 44%.

Ms O’Neill added: “The people of the North clearly voted to see their future in the European Union in the referendum last June.”

She added: “They did so not because the EU is such a great institution, but because it is in their best interests politically, socially and economically, and because they did not want to see any strengthening of the border in Ireland. The British government’s reckless Brexit agenda offers nothing to the people of the North who are being dragged out against our will.”