Restore Stormont, urge Coveney and Bradley after talks
FOREIGN Affairs Minister Simon Coveney had his first meeting with newlyappointed Northern Secretary Karen Bradley yesterday – with both hoping to make progress on the powersharing deadlock.
Mr Coveney, who flew into London from a visit to the Middle East, said the talks had been ‘very good’ and he expected they were ‘going to work very well together’.
The Tánaiste admitted there remained ‘significant challenges’ but insisted both governments wanted to find a way to resolve the stand-off in the North.
He said: ‘Everybody knows that there are time constraints in terms of the work that we need to do but also I think everybody agrees that we want devolved government again in Northern Ireland.’
The meeting came after a week where political relations in the North were further strained, this time by Sinn Féin MP Barry McElduff who posted a social media video of himself posing with a Kingsmill branded loaf on his head on the anniversary of the 1976 massacre in south Armagh which saw republican paramilitaries shoot dead ten Protestant workmen.
Mr Coveney attacked the ‘really, really stupid and insensitive’ actions of Mr McElduff.
Mr McElduff, pictured right, apologised for the video and insisted it was not a reference to the massacre, was suspended by Sinn Féin for three months.
Unionists reacted angrily, both to the post and the extent of Sinn Féin’s punishment, and the incident appeared to further reduce the already bleak prospects of a deal to restore powersharing.
The situation was exacerbated on Wednesday when a number of unionist politicians retweeted a graphic satirical cartoon that portrayed the Mr McElduff controversy by depicting the aftermath of Kingsmill, with blood running from a bulletriddled van.
The incidents prompted the sole Kingsmill survivor Alan Black to implore politicians on all sides to stop trying to ‘poke each other’s eye out’ and instead help the victims. However, a week of political rancour and animosity appeared to end on a more optimistic note when two senior DUP and Sinn Féin members engaged in more conciliatory exchanges on BBC Northern Ireland’s The View on Thursday.
In a forthright condemnation of the Kingsmill outrage, Sinn Féin’s John O’Dowd, who lost three family members at the hands of loyalist paramilitaries the day before the atrocity, said he was ‘ashamed’ by the sectarian attack, which at the time was claimed by the South Armagh Republican Action Force
The DUP’s Edwin Poots welcomed the remarks and said his party was determined to see devolution returned.
Mr Coveney said: ‘I think the unfortunate things that have happened in relation to Kingsmill this week and the absolutely understandable upset of families because of a really, really stupid and insensitive occurrence is a reminder of just how important legacy and reconciliation is.
‘So, that’s why I hope people will get some encouragement from the tone of the interaction between Edwin Poots and John O’Dowd, which I hope is the tone we can continue in.’
Speaking after the meeting, Mr Coveney also told reporters that he did not believe there was any ambiguity in the agreement reached in December on the border during Brexit negotiations.
He added: ‘I don’t think there is any ambiguity in the context of an all-Ireland economy and the need to protect north-south cooperation in the context of the Good Friday Agreement.’
Mr Coveney and Ms Bradley are set to meet again next week.
‘We’re going to work very well together’