The Good Friday Agreement
In May 1997 the Labour Party leader Tony Blair took power with a
massive parliamentary majority. He quickly set about drawing Sinn Féin
into the political process. By mid-June, the demand for
decommissioning prior to Sinn Féin’s entry into talks was dropped. The
IRA declared another ceasefire on 20 July 1997, and Sinn Féin entered
the talks on 9 September. Throughout the negotiations Unionists
refused to engage directly with Sinn Féin, converting them into
Dayton-like proximity talks. Reports of splits and dissension within
both the IRA and Sinn Féin underlined growing nervousness among
republicans. There was also dissatisfaction within David Trimble’s
UUP. Four of the its ten MPs made a public call for the party to leave
the talks.
In April the chairman of the talks, George Mitchell, set a target date
of 9 April for an agreement in order to facilitate a referendum in
May. In late March the negotiations intensified, although many issues
were still outstanding. The UUP and SDLP held differing views of how
power would be shared between both communities in Northern Ireland.
Sinn Féin was deeply uneasy at the prospect of any new Northern
Ireland assembly and contributed little to negotiations on this
matter. The UUP was concerned the remit of cross-border bodies and
their relationship with the Northern Ireland Assembly and Irish
Parliament, and anxious to tie the Irish government down on the
proposed changes to its constitutional claim on Northern Ireland’s
territory.
A copy of the Good Friday Agreement was delivered to every home in
Northern Ireland in April 1998. It had five main constitutional
provisions. First, Northern Ireland’s future constitutional status was
to be in the hands of its citizens. Second, if the people of Ireland,
north and south, wanted a united Ireland, they could have one by
voting for it. Third, Northern Ireland’s current constitutional
position would remain within the United Kingdom. Fourth, Northern
Ireland’s citizens would have the right to ‘identify themselves and be