The border between Northern Ireland and the Republic...
...is one of the most contentious in the world
Thousands have died over it
Decided by politics, not geography, its irregular shape looks odd
It divides roads, houses...
...in one place it even separates a church from its graveyard
For an outsider looking at the Irish border...
...it doesn’t make very much sense, but it does have its own curious logic
So what’s the story behind it?
And what really divides Ireland?
Even after 100 years, this border is still deeply sensitive
Ireland’s border was created in 1921
While Northern Ireland remained in the United Kingdom...
...the south left
But to understand why Ireland was divided in the first place...
...we need to go back in time
In the 1600s, the British, who were mostly Protestants...
...started colonising Catholic Ireland
They took control of the north...
...discriminating against Catholics and other dissenters
In 1798 it led to a major rebellion
It was crushed by the British, who decided to adopt a new policy...
...total control
In 1801, the whole of Ireland became part of the United Kingdom
For Protestants in the north, it was a huge victory
For Catholics in the south who wanted independence...
...it was a catastrophe
But it also brought a new opportunity...
...to influence the British government
There were now Irish MPs going to Westminster...
...and those people became very significant players in British politics
Westminster became the stage for the campaign...
...for home rule for Ireland...
...with politicians arguing both sides of the debate
And back on the streets of Ireland, tensions escalated
In 1916, pro-independence Catholics...
...carried out an armed insurrection...
...that came to be known as the Easter Rising
It triggered further revolution that turned into a war for independence
With Protestant paramilitary groups in the north...
...fighting to remain part of the United Kingdom
In 1921, the British government ended the war...
...signing a treaty that gave Southern Ireland independence
The treaty was signed on December 21st...
...and Dublin showed its approval...
...with a colourful parade of Gaelic enthusiasm
But it wasn’t a complete victory for the separatists
The British government had decided to carve the country in two
While the northern Protestant communities...
...would remain part of the United Kingdom...
...the south would be free to rule itself
It radically redrew the map of the United Kingdom
And for the first time an international border was drawn...
...between Northern Ireland and the south
There was a very simple and a very crude calculation...
...as to where the Northern Irish border was drawn
It was about trying to have as many Protestants...
...as possible in the north, and as few Protestants as possible in the south
That’s why the shape of this border is so highly unusual
Partition satisfied no one
Catholics in the south could now govern themselves...
...but their country had been split in two
Protestants in the north had hoped the whole of Ireland...
...would stay in the United Kingdom
And there was one group...
...that was put in an especially intolerable position
Catholics in the north arguably lost the most here
They were trapped in a state which they didn’t want
They were never, it seemed, in 1921...
...ever going to be sufficiently numerous to vote their way out of this
Over 400,000 Catholics were now trapped...
...on the wrong side of the border
Their plight would trigger decades of bloodshed
In the north, anti-Catholic discrimination became rife
By the late 1960s, civil-rights demonstrations in America...
...inspired Northern Irish Catholics to protest peacefully for equality
The police often used brutal force to crush the marches
And loyalist Protestants targeted the protests...
...as well as holding their own marches
In 1969, a confrontation at a Protestant march...
...sparked days of clashes that spread across Northern Ireland
Overwhelmed, Northern Ireland’s prime minister...
...asked the British government for help
British troops were sent in
It was the beginning of three decades of violence in Northern Ireland...
...now called “The Troubles”
In 1972, British soldiers opened fire on Catholic protesters
14 died and at least 15 were injured
It became known as “Bloody Sunday”
I was fired on by the paratroopers...
...and yet parliamentary democracy was such...
...that I was not allowed to speak
The event radicalised angry Catholics
Membership of republican paramilitary groups...
...such as the IRA, swelled
And deadly attacks against Protestants and British troops increased
In my opinion, we cannot do without the Irish Republican Army
Republican paramilitaries were able to use that border...
...to their advantage at various points
They could flee across that border
They were able to use it to store weapons
Border infrastructure was itself a target...
...as a symbol of British rule in Ireland
In response, the British armed forces...
...became a permanent presence at the border...
...and established bases elsewhere in Northern Ireland
The IRA argued they were fighting a military occupation...
...but loyalist Northern Irish militias saw the border...
...as protection against a Catholic majority
They attacked those they deemed republican sympathisers
We’re going to turn this town into a burning holocaust
A “tit for tat” campaign of violence began
Three car bombs in quick succession ripped through the village...
...just a few miles from Londonderry
Over the 30 years of The Troubles, more than 3,700 people were killed...
...many, many more were injured...
...and most of those who were killed and injured were civilians
As headlines of attacks and atrocities increased...
...global leaders attempted to promote peace...
The history of Northern Ireland has been written...
...in the blood of its children and their parents
In 1998, there was a breakthrough
Today we can take a collective breath and begin to blow away...
...let’s hope, the cobwebs of the past
The British and Irish governments...
...and most of the political parties in Northern Ireland...
...came together to sign a landmark deal...
...that became known as the Good Friday Agreement
The deal removed the hard border between the two countries...
...and stated that if majorities in both north and south...
...wanted to reunite Ireland, they could
The following two decades were relatively stable in Northern Ireland...
...until now
In 2016, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union
It opted for a complete break...
...ending free movement of people and goods
As part of the UK, Northern Ireland would also have to leave
But with the Republic of Ireland still a member...
...and the border between the two countries now fairly open...
...there was a problem
As they were now governed by different rules again...
...the obvious solution was to re-establish a hard border
A move no one wanted
The only other option would be a de facto trade border in the Irish Sea...
...separating Northern Ireland from the rest of the UK
This proposal was called the Northern Irish Protocol...
...and it removed the need for a hard border
But Northern Irish loyalists weren’t happy
We are totally opposed to the protocol
We will neither accept it, nor will we work it
At the same time, increasing numbers of Northern Irish...
...are welcoming unity with the south
There is this growing centre ground of people...
...who may or may not be religious, people who have grown up in peace...
...who don’t understand the forces...
...which drove Northern Ireland into conflict...
...who don’t identify with them
These changes might make a united Ireland more feasible...
...but they could also reignite old tensions in the north
One of the things which concerns many people in Northern Ireland...
...whatever their view on Irish unity...
...is that if we did have a vote in favour of Irish unity...
...particularly a narrow vote in favour of Irish unity...
...that could precipitate violence in Northern Ireland
And as difficult and fraught as the Brexit process was...
...in the rest of the UK, there was never any serious prospect of riots...
...on the streets of London, of people being killed, of bombs going off
In Northern Ireland that would be a very real possibility...
...and perhaps a probability
Thanks for watching
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...and the Irish border, click the link
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