Ian Paisley and the DUP must be looking forward already to next year’s big do. It’s the 10th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. They’ll be looking forward to it just like Camilla looked forward to the big service for Princess Diana!
The ke
y architects of the agreement, like Senator George Mitchell, Tony Blair, Bertie Ahern, David Trimble and Seamus Mallon, will all be at the “party”. They’ll be celebrating the lasting legacy of the accord and the fact that it shows the way forward towards possible solutions to other conflicts in the world.
The Queen’s University-organised conference is to be on May 22 and 23 and is to be named after Senator Mitchell, who chaired the long and immensely difficult talks that led to the 1998 breakthrough. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the former taoiseach Albert Reynolds and former president Mary Robinson are all expected to join academics, journalists, lawyers and others for the bash.
Yes. just about everybody will be at the ball with the prince but what about Cinderella? As a bitter opponent of the Agreement will Dr Paisley feel obliged to stay away? Will he have to sit, sad and lonely, on his own by the fireside wearing the dreaded sackcloth and ashes?
But maybe the glittering coach will call for him after all, as Senator Mitchell believes Ian Paisley and his then ally Robert McCartney made a vital contribution to the accord. But ironically, it wasn’t the contribution they intended.
They walked out when Sinn Féin was admitted to the talks. In his book “Making Peace”, George Mitchell says, “If their objective was, as they repeatedly insisted, to end the process, then their walkout was a fatal error. Reaching agreement without their presence was extremely difficult; it would have been impossible with them in the room.”
McCartney
Later he says, “I believe that had Paisley and McCartney stayed and fought from within, there would have been no agreement. Their absence freed the UUP from daily attacks at the negotiating table, and gave the party room to negotiate that it might not otherwise have had. To their credit, when the time came, the Ulster Unionists rose to the occasion.”
At the end of the marathon talks Senator Mitchell spoke of having a dream. It was that he would one day return to Northern Ireland. Along with his young son, Andrew, he would enjoy, “one of the most beautiful landscapes on earth” and sit quietly in the visitors’ gallery of the Assembly to listen to a debate on “the ordinary issues of life in a peaceful democratic society”.
If he does make it back to Stormont, perhaps during his visit next year, maybe the good Senator will meet up with his old friend again. At their first meeting on June 10, 1996 Doctor Paisley welcomed him to Stormont roaring, “No. No. No. No. No…”
Reunions are always interesting as they give people a chance to see how their old acquaintances have been doing in the meantime.
