Violence in Northern Ireland

  • Young people have hurled bricks, fireworks and gasoline bombs at police and set hijacked cars and a bus on fire during a week of violence on the streets of Northern Ireland. 
  • The chaotic scenes have stirred memories of decades of Catholic-Protestant conflict, known as “The Troubles”. 
  • A 1998 peace deal had ended large-scale violence but have not resolve Northern Ireland’s deep-rooted tensions. 
UNDERSTANDING IRELAND AND ITS HISTORY 
  • The island of Ireland is divided between two political entities - 
  • 1. The Republic of Ireland - officially named Ireland(Catholic dominated).  
  • 2. Northern Ireland - part of the United Kingdom(protestant dominated). 
  • In 16th–17th century Tudor conquest led to colonization by settlers from Britain. 
  • Northern Ireland’s Catholic minority used to experienced discrimination in the Protestant-run state.
  • In the 1690s, a system of Protestant English rule was designed to materially disadvantage the Catholic majority and Protestant dissenters, and was extended during the 18th century.
  • With the Acts of Union in 1801, Ireland became a part of the United Kingdom.  
  • 1921 (in some sources, 1922)- Partition of the island, creating the Irish (26 counties) free State (Republic of Ireland- 1949) and Northern Ireland(6 counties).
  • Northern Ireland saw civil unrest from the late 1960s until the 1990s. 
  • Violence subsided following a political agreement - The Good Friday(or Belfast) Agreement in 1998 in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
REASON FOR VIOLENCE
  • The violence has been largely in Protestant areas in and around Belfast and Northern Ireland’s second city, Londonderry, although the disturbances have spread to Catholic neighbourhoods. 
  • Britain left the EU’s economic embrace on December 31, and the new trade arrangements quickly became an irritant to Northern Ireland unionists who want to stay in the UK.
  • Early trade glitches, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, led to some empty supermarket shelves, fueling alarm.
  • There was anger that British Prime Minister long insisted there would be no new checks on trade as a result of Brexit, had downplayed the scale of the changes wrought by leaving the EU.
  • Some in Northern Ireland’s British loyalist community feel as if their identity is under threat. 
  • Many other loyalists believe that, de facto, Northern Ireland has ceased to be as much a part of the UK as it was.

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