Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness, former deadly enemies, assumed office today in northern Ireland as the heads of a new power-sharing government.
The extraordinary display of cross-community unity at Stormont marked a symbolic end to the Troubles and opened an era of cooperation between former enemies.
I used to cover this accommodation for Green Left Weekly in the context and at the time of the Good Friday Agreement.That’s when the damage was done as it signalled a major turn for Sinn Fein as McGuinness and Adams in correctly junking the armed struggle placed all the republican eggs in the Stormont basket under an orientation that in effect was relying on the fecundity of Catholics to drive an electoral strategy. This is the “whisper” that ends this episode of Irish nationalism and the death of so many especially the 1982 Hunger Strikers in the H blocks.
Here are a few comments from the past that observers need to be reminded of:
McAliskey warns of cease fire trapRepublicans discussSinn Fein should leave peace process: