Belfast Agreement
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The Belfast Agreement (also known as the Good Friday Agreement and, more rarely, as the Stormont Agreement) was a political development in the Northern Ireland peace process. It was signed in Belfast on April 10 1998 (Good Friday) by the British and Irish (Republic of Ireland) governments and endorsed by most Northern Ireland political parties. It was endorsed by the voters of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in separate referenda on May 23 1998. The Democratic Unionist Party was the only large party that opposed the Agreement.
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Main provisions
- The principle that the constitutional future of Northern Ireland should be determined by the majority vote of its citizens.
- A commitment by all parties to "exclusively peaceful and democratic means".
- The establishment of a Northern Ireland Assembly with devolved legislative powers.
- Creation of a 'power-sharing' Northern Ireland Executive, using the D'Hondt method to allocate Ministries proportionally to the main parties.
- Creation of a North-South Ministerial Council and North-South Implementation Bodies to bring about cross-border cooperation in policy and programmes on a number of issues.
- Establishment of a British-Irish Council, composed of representatives from the governments of the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, the United Kingdom, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man, to discuss areas of common concern.
- Conditional early release within two years of paramilitary prisoners belonging to organisations observing a ceasefire.
- Establishment of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission
- A two year target for decommissioning of paramilitary weapons.
- The abolition of the Republic's territorial claim to Northern Ireland via the modification Articles 2 and 3 of its constitution.
- New legislation for Northern Ireland on policing, human rights and equality.
- Normalisation of security measures, e.g. closure of redundant army bases.
- Police reform. Undertaken by the Patten Commission (1998-1999).
- Equality of social, economic and cultural rights of all ethnic communities e.g. official recognition of the Irish and Ulster-Scots languages as equal to English.
Vague wording of some of the provisions (described as "constructive ambiguity"), which helped ensure acceptance of the agreement at the time, served to postpone debate on some of the more contentious issues - most notably paramilitary decommissioning, police reform and normalisation. A date of May 2000 was set for total disarming of all paramilitary groups. This was not achieved and delayed the establishment of the Assembly and Executive, because one of the four main parties in the Assembly - Provisional Sinn Féin - was "inextricably linked" to the largest paramilitary group, the Provisional IRA, and unionists refused to share power with this party, while the PIRA remained armed.
The Assembly and Executive were eventually established in December 1999 on the understanding that decommissioning would begin immediately, but were suspended within two months due to lack of progress, before being re-established in May 2000 as Provisional IRA decommissioning eventually began.
Aside from the decommissioning issue, however, ongoing paramilitary activity (albeit relatively low level compared to the past) by the Provisional Irish Republican Army - e.g. arms importations, "punishment beatings", intelligence-gathering and rioting - was also a stumbling block.
The overall result of these problems was to damage confidence among unionists in the Agreement, which was exploited by the anti-Agreement DUP which eventually defeated the pro-Agreement UUP in the 2003 Assembly election. The UUP had already resigned from the power-sharing Executive in 2002 following arrests of Provisional Sinn Féin personnel on charges of gathering intelligence for use by terrorists. (These charges were eventually dropped in 2005 on the controversial grounds that pursual would not be "in the public interest". Immediately afterwards, one of the accused Provisional Sinn Féin members, Denis Donaldson was exposed as a Government agent.)
On 26 September 2005, however, it was announced that the Provisional Irish Republican Army had completely decommissioned its arsenal of weapons and "put them beyond use". Nonetheless, many unionists, most notably the DUP, remain sceptical and agreement on how to restore the power-sharing assembly had not been reached as of March 2006.
Referenda
In May 1998 there were separate referenda in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland to endorse the Belfast Agreement. The "No" vote in Northern Ireland came predominantly from unionists opposed to perceived concessions being made to nationalists and republicans. However opinion polls suggest a slim majority of unionists may have voted "Yes". In the Republic of Ireland the electorate voted upon the Nineteenth Amendment. This amendment both permitted the state to comply with the Belfast Agreement and provided for the removal of the 'territorial claim' contained in Articles 2 and 3. The Republic of Ireland voted upon the Amsterdam Treaty on the same day. The results of the two, simultaneous referenda on the Belfast Agreement were as follows:
| Yes | No | Turnout | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Northern Ireland | 676,966 (71%) | 274,879 (29%) | 81% |
| Republic of Ireland | 1,442,583 (94%) | 85,748 (6%) | 56% |
See also
- Northern Ireland peace process
- Independent Commission on Policing for Northern Ireland
- Independent International Commission on Decommissioning
- Sunningdale Agreement
- Anglo-Irish Agreement
External links
- North-South Ministerial Council/An Chomhairle Aireachta Thuaidh/Theas
- Belfast Agreement (full text)
- British-Irish Councilde:Karfreitagsabkommen
es:Acuerdo de Viernes Santo ga:Comhaontú Aoine an Chéasta he:הסכם יום שישי הטוב ja:ベルファスト合意 ka:დიდი პარასკევის შეთანხმება nl:Goede vrijdag akkoord no:Belfastavtalen pl:Porozumienie wielkopiątkowe pt:Acordo de Belfast fi:Pitkänperjantain sopimus sv:Långfredagsavtalet