Failure to secure Brexit deal ‘may lead to renewed violence’

CABINET ministers have ramped up warnings of violence in Northern Ireland if Britain fails to secure a Brexit deal, with one suggesting dissident republicans are already using uncertainty to boost recruitment.

Another warned that any new infrastructure required by the Canada-style trade deal promoted by some Brexiteers would create targets for those looking to heighten tension.

One cabinet minister said: “There is a delicate equilibrium in Northern Ireland that the Belfast Agreement has held in place. So for example, while people with republican sympathies may not have a huge amount of love for the EU, previously they could move across the border freely.

“Now they see a situation in which the British Government might do things that threaten that. There are new risks that they can see and point to. That uncertainty allows a rump of dissidents to create a narrative for their people. There are around 500 of them, but with that narrative 500 can become 1,000.”

The minister also highlighted that the EU’s requirement for a customs border in the Irish Sea might also aggravate those with loyalist instincts in Belfast.

Another cabinet minister said: “I haven’t seen anything that suggests using technology as a solution in Northern Ireland can work. The problem is as soon as you put anything — anything — on or near the border, then there will be someone who wants to cause trouble that could choose to put a bomb underneath it.

“Then you have to put a fence around it, then you have to send someone out in a uniform to guard it, then before you know it you are back where you were in the Troubles. It’s just something that is very difficult to see how it works and no one has said anything or is saying anything to counter that.”