Belfast Disturbances

Watched the video of your man going on fire about a dozen times today. I hope he is permanently disfigured. Good enough for him

The DUP entered a confidence and Supply agreement with the Tories in 2017 to give the Tories control of a hung parliament.

The DUP leveraged that into an extra £1.1billion funding for N.I.
Now the interesting thing is that even in 2017 at the time of the agreement, the Irish government raised concerns that such an agreement was an explicit threat to the NI peace process.

The DUP chose not only to pursue Brexit, but to ignore the vote of the N.I electorate's rejection of Brexit in their pursuit of it and supporting the Tories in its implementation.

The DUP had 2 and half years of confidence and Supply to realise the Tories were going to screw them.

The GFA and the EU's stance of supporting no border on the island of Ireland and that any EU external border would not be implemented between N.I and ROU was clear from 2016.

The lack of preparation, is a UK government failing.
A Government that the DUP could have collapsed at any point prior to BoJo's jingoism election on lies in 2019.

Sympathy for unionism at their current predicament is hard to find, because to be quite honest...
Helen Keller could have seen it coming.

The DUP latched on to short term gain in supporting the Tories, to the detriment of not only Unionism but the entirety of N.I.

This isn't an ROI or EU issue, it's a UK govt issue.
Unionism has encountered it's annus horribilis and it's only likely to become worse come the local elections.

Funnily enough, the cynic in me sees the current rioting more as a ploy to engage unionist voters and build fear of a wipeout, than I do it having any other purpose.
Riot is the language of the unheard....
Noone is muting Arlene and co, but when they aren't getting their own way?
The LCC are trotted out, convenient reminder.

I think the Unionist working and political classes are arriving at an existential crossroads

Scottish independence
Tory party apathy and betrayal
DUP MPs going on a solo run
Chasm between unionist working and political classes
Catholic parity
Economic Sea Border
Talk of UI

All very ironic and welcome in the centenary year of the creation of the 6 counties as a 'state'.

kravmaga wrote: »

Or another angle/ take on the rioting, scum will be scum.

The PSNI are bearing the brunt of feral teenagers throwing petrol bombs and missiles (stones, bricks, ) etc.

Its plain and nasty angry youths ,anti- social behaviour, they are probably organising on some sort of social media app/ platform.

Certainly not good PR Belfast or Northern Ireland as its all over the media in UK and ROI.

Looks like a scene from a warzone. Not sure what they are trying to achieve.

A good blast from a water cannon might do the rioters no harm.

https://www.rte.ie/news/2021/0404/1207838-northern-ireland-violence/

Northern water cannon always had the pressure turned down, used to see European riots where the water cannon would send the guy bouncing down the road ,

Beechwoodspark wrote: »

Tit for tat as usual up there

Mostly tits to be honest.

Bambi wrote: »

Who was it announced that they were going to trigger Article 16 and impose a hard border on the Island of Ireland? I'll give you a clue: It wasnt the Brits.

Eh, it wasn't going to impose a hard border it was going to limit vital exports to the UK.

How's the whole pro-Brexit pro-Irexit thing coming along? Have you enough for a game of 5-a-side yet?

Apologies, haven’t really looked at news in a few days.

What are the Belfast riots about?

Bambi wrote: »

Who was it announced that they were going to trigger Article 16 and impose a hard border on the Island of Ireland? I'll give you a clue: It wasnt the Brits.

Who rolled back on that statement within 2hrs?
Same answer.

Who spent 4yrs trying to play brinkmanship with a withdrawal agreement?
Who signed a WA in January 2020and then tried to introduce legislation to over ride it?
Who when that failed spent months threatening Article 16 invocation rather than actually preparing the agreement they presented as a win?
The Irish Sea border, supply issues and NI isolation are all the direct result of Boris Johnson's oven ready deal.
The deal the DUP supported, the deal to get Brexit done.
Leaving aside all enmity and even the schadenfreude that some may feel at Britain's continued ineptitude?

This is what Brexit is, these are all issues that anyone with a modicum of political knowledge and in particular knowledge of the GFA and NI situation, knew was going to be the outcome.

The DUP are not the architects of the current situation, but at every opportunity they had to actually place a marker down and make the deal work for NI?
They chose to support some notion of British and Tory exceptionalism, rather than face the very clear reality of what Britain being outside the customs union meant for N.I.

Bambi wrote: »

Who'd be in favour of Irexit? if you're going to keep on attacking the poster rather than the post you'd want improve your aim

Attack? Very sensitive. It's your views I'm having a pop at. You've nothing good to say about the EU so I presume you think Ireland should leave it?