Boris Johnson is willing to put the protocol on Northern Ireland on hold and go to a trade war with the European Union less than a year after signing it and about which they have always expressed reservations that have now erupted. Brussels was scheduled to present a new proposal this Wednesday that qualified the agreement currently signed and in force, simplifying it, but the British government, pressured by Northern Irish unionism, has gone ahead, sending its “new” and its own protocol on Tuesday, under threat to go to that trade war.
‘What does it cost the EU to put a new protocol in place? In our opinion, very little “, has defended the British minister for Brexit, David Frost, in a speech delivered in Lisbon during which he announced the sending of a” new legal text “to the EU partners with substantial changes in the regimen for the Ulster.
The United Kingdom has decided that it does not want to comply with the regulations outlined in the Brexit agreement regarding the control of goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland, something that had been agreed with the EU to avoid a hard border between the two Ireland , thus putting into question the Peace Accords of Good Friday.
The Community Executive, for its part, which initiated a disciplinary proceedings against the British Government for this breach, had announced for Wednesday a proposal with “creative and solid” solutions that would help the Northern Irish to comply with the requirements of the protocol.
The Vice-President of the Commission responsible for relations with the United Kingdom, Maros Sefcovic, made it clear in a speech last week that the EU will in no case agree to renegotiate the existing protocol, but that there is a will to find “pragmatic” solutions that unblock the situation.
Violence in Ulster
It should be remembered that this year there have already been episodes of street violence in the Protestant neighborhoods of Belfast and Derry with images that evoked, albeit distantly, those of the darkest years in Northern Ireland. The unionist parties of Ulster have always considered the current protocol a betrayal by, they believe, breaking the territorial unity of the United Kingdom and bringing them de facto closer to Southern Ireland than to Great Britain.
Thus, faced with these pressures, the British Government once again threatens the Twenty-seven with making use of the article provided in the Treaty negotiated between the EU and the United Kingdom to suspend the provisions of the framework agreement of the mutual relationship.
Although the British minister has not given all the details of the document sent to Brussels, he has pointed out some elements that it contains and that for the European Union are unacceptable output, for example creating a dispute resolution mechanism that leaves out the Court of Justice of the European Union.
