U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has threatened to block a free trade deal with Britain should the UK scrap some sections of the Northern Ireland Protocol, a controversial section of the Brexit agreement that has empowered the European Union to effectively divide the United Kingdom.
Agreed to by Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government in 2019 during Brexit negotiations with the EU, the Northern Ireland Protocol has seen trade barriers erected between Great Britain and Northern Ireland — sometimes referred to as Ulster — despite the latter being as integral a part of the United Kingdom as the former.
In order to supposedly protect the EU’s Single Market and to prevent a hard border from being imposed between Northern Ireland and the independent Republic of Ireland, an EU member-state, EU customs and regulations are to a great extent still in force in Northern Ireland, effectively creating a sea border between the province and the rest of the UK.
Citing the harm done to British businesses by the harsh way the Protocol is being implemented, Boris Johnson’s government has proposed legislation allowing it to cancel certain sections of the Protocol to remove intra-UK trade barriers — resulting in threats from the European Union of a trade war, which would further destabilize European economies already reeling under massive inflation and the fallout from the war in Ukraine.
Firmly siding with the globalist European Union, America’s Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, has threatened to block any potential trade deal with the United Kingdom should its government scrap the Northern Ireland Protocol, citing supposed concerns over the future of the Good Friday Agreement that brought peace to the traditionally conflict-ridden area.
“The Good Friday Accords are the bedrock of peace in Northern Ireland and a beacon of hope for the entire world. Ensuring there remains no physical border between the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland is absolutely necessary for upholding this landmark agreement, which has transformed Northern Ireland,” Pelosi said in a statement on Thursday.
“It is deeply concerning that the United Kingdom is now seeking to unilaterally discard the Northern Ireland Protocol. Negotiated agreements like the Protocol preserve the important progress and stability forged by the Good Friday Accords, which continue to enjoy strong bipartisan and bicameral support in the United States Congress,” the 82-year-old Democrat politician added.
In fact, however, the Protocol has brought instability, as it is despised by British unionists who believe it has undermined Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom and are, as a result, refusing to form a power-sharing regional government until it is scrapped.
Pelosi backed up her position by reiterating her threat to block a trade deal with Britain, however, saying that “if the United Kingdom chooses to undermine the Good Friday Accords, the Congress cannot and will not support a bilateral free trade agreement with the United Kingdom.”
“Respectful of the will of the British people and of Brexit, I urge constructive, collaborative and good-faith negotiations to implement an agreement that upholds peace. The children of Northern Ireland, who have never known the bloody conflict and do not want to go back, deserve a future free of the violence where all may reach their fulfillment,” her statement concluded.
It is unclear as to how much weight Pelosi’s threats will have on London, with trade talks between Britain and America having stalled after the election of the historically anti-British and anti-Brexit President Joe Biden anyway.
The 79-year-old American leader may have decided to follow through on pre-referendum threats from his former boss Barack Obama to send the UK to the “back of the queue” for a trade deal as punishment for its people voting for independence from the European Union.
With the left-wing leadership in both the White House and Congress firmly entrenched on the European Union’s side, the British government has been seeking to bypass the federal government in Washington D.C. and strike American trade deals on a state-by-state basis.
The threats from Pelosi come after the European Union was reported to be planning to specifically target the constituencies (electoral districts) of British government ministers and pro-Brexit MPs in a trade war in order to effectively blackmail them into backing down or their voters into replacing them with pro-EU representatives.
Responding to Pelosi’s comments, Britain’s Minister of State for Northern Ireland, Conservative MP Conor Burns, said: “The absolute priority of the UK Government is protecting the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement and the institutions that spring from it.
“As Speaker Pelosi knows, we seek an ambitious [Free Trade Agreement] with the U.S. But there can be no connection between that and doing the right thing for [Northern Ireland]. None.”
It is notable that both Pelosi and President Biden remained silent about the violations of the principles of the Good Friday Agreement when the European Union unilaterally moved to impose a hard land border — despite objections from Dublin — during the Chinese coronavirus crisis, in order to prevent shipments of vaccines to the UK.
Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka
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