Escape for Northern Ireland?

Britain and Ireland may not have the power to impose peace on Northern Ireland, but between them they may well have the power to impose a framework for peace discussions. Issuing a “Joint Framework Document” in Belfast on Wednesday, they sought bravely and brilliantly to do just that.

The framework document contains a major concession on each side. Ireland’s concession is the renunciation of a claim over Northern Ireland that is now written into its constitution. Ireland will not henceforth aspire to Irish reunification against the will of the majority in Northern Ireland. Since the Protestant unionists, who generally favor remaining part of Great Britain, currently constitute a majority of at least 57%, this concession moves Irish reunification to the indefinite future, though by an earlier agreement Britain has promised not to block a transfer of sovereignty if and when the will of the majority changes.

Britain’s concession is the proposal of a Northern Ireland parliament empowered to proceed in tandem with the Irish Parliament to create a “North/South body” whose function would be to facilitate “beneficial cooperation” in trade and cultural relations.

“Beneficial cooperation” sounds innocuous. Historically, however, the geography-defying claim that Northern Ireland should not belong politically to the island on which it is situated has been maintained by severing every non-geographical link between north and south. Until the 1970s, one could not place a direct telephone call from Dublin to Belfast. Trade, even now, is almost nonexistent.

It is for this reason that the unionist side has greeted the proposed North/South body with dismay. Prime Minister John Major correctly stated at the joint British-Irish press conference Wednesday that the body would be “without constitutional tensions”: Its creation has no effect on sovereignty. But when a British reporter asked him, “Wouldn’t a North-South body merely be an all-Ireland government in waiting?” the question was not out of place. This is how it feels to the unionists, and this is why it constitutes a concession for the British.

Britain will distribute 600,000 copies of the document directly to the Northern Irish people. If they find it reasonable not as a comprehensive solution but simply as a framework for discussion, their political leaders may find it impossible not to go along.