North Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party, DUP, has dismissed a suggestion that agri-food trade could be regulated on an all-Ireland basis after Brexit. Agri-food is a particular challenge to the no hard border policy because of strict EU rules on food imports.
European Parliament's Brexit coordinator has said he got a shock on his recent visit to Belfast when he saw the city's peace walls. Guy Verhofstadt described Northern Ireland as having a frozen conflict, and said the Good Friday Agreement must not be damaged by Brexit.
Lord Peter Hain has called on the government to soften its approach to ”taking the UK out of the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice (ECJ).” The former secretary of state claimed that such a move could result in Northern Ireland losing millions of pounds of peace funding. The ECJ oversees reconciliation grants to North Ireland in the region of £240 million.
The pro-British Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) managed to remain the biggest party with a single seat margin in the Northern Ireland Assembly as the Irish nationalist Sinn Fein closed in on them following March 2 election, according to the latest results announced over the weekend.
The first reactions to the announced Mercosur-European trade deal and exchange of proposals next week have surfaced. The Ulster Farmers’ Union president, Ian Marshall, says the European Union trade deal on offer to Mercosur countries is an ‘unacceptable risk’ to the livelihoods of farmers in Northern Ireland.
The Argentine Ambassador to the United Kingdom, Alicia Castro made an official visit to Northern Ireland where she was received by Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness. They agreed on stressing the importance of dialogue and called for ties between both parties to be strengthened.