New Agenda group blasts declaration

By Ray O’Hanlon

The lobby group Americans for a New Irish Agenda this week blasted the recent Irish-British government Hillsborough Declaration, describing it as a danger to the peace process.

ANIA, in a strongly worded statement, vented particular spleen on Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble and the British government.

But in a departure from the generally prevailing trend of recent years, the group, chaired by attorney and veteran activist Frank Durkan, also leveled strong criticism at the Irish government.

The statement said that the declaration had the potential "to cause untold mischief and possibly wreck the entire peace process."

The statement referred to the Good Friday peace agreement’s outlining of May 2000 as the deadline for the completion of paramilitary arms decommissioning. It stressed that this agreement had been "enthusiastically and overwhelmingly endorsed in a referendum by the Irish people, North and South."

The declaration envisions a start to such decommissioning a month after formation of a governing executive, a scenario that, in theory, could considerably move forward the date when decommissioning actually begins.

The ANIA statement singled out Trimble as being "the person who had constantly and repeatedly obstructed the progress toward a just and lasting peace."

Trimble, the statement said, "has insisted on a decommissioning timetable that is totally at odds with what he himself had signed on for. And what is worse, the two governments, who are also signatories to the agreement, have endorsed his tactics and handed him victory on a plate that he does not deserve."

The statement said that the long and bitter history of dealing with successive British governments on Irish matters "should hardly surprise us at this turn of events."

However, it did not stop with the British government. The "government in Dublin has some explaining to do," the statement continued.

"It has long been the complaint of activist Irish-Americans that in past years the biggest obstacle in out efforts to obtain official Washington’s interest in the Northern Ireland problem was the indifference (and that is being charitable) of the government in Dublin.

"Lately, however, we had a noticed a welcome change in that attitude and had come to experience a confidence that the Dublin government would stand by the Northern Nationalists and help them achieve a measure of dignity that for so long had been denied them. Sad to say this is not the case."

ANIA accused the Irish government of not calling Trimble’s bluff by using the language of the Good Friday accord against the UUP leader. Such a failure, the group said, "bids fair to wreck the whole process."

The statement concluded by saying that if this occurred, Irish America would be asking some very pointed questions, one being why such deference had been shown Trimble.

"Supporters of Northern Nationalists have a right to know the rationale behind the decision of both governments to do a 180-degree turn on the issue of decommissioning to the undisguised delight of a man who has thrown up every possible road block on the road toward a true peace."

While relations between successive Irish governments and Irish-American activists have improved in recent years, there have been bumps along the road.

Most notably, Irish-American groups expressed disagreement with Irish government’s support for changes to Articles Two and Three of the Irish Constitution. And there was critical reaction to Dublin’s acceptance of Sinn Féin’s temporary expulsion from peace talks early last year following two murders in Belfast linked by the RUC to republicans.