Joe Biden calls for powersharing return to bring economic boost to Northern Ireland

Mr Biden met with Stormont’s political leaders before making the speech at the university’s new campus in Belfast city centre. Picture: : Aaron Chown/PA Wire

US president Joe Biden expressed hopes of a return to powersharing in Northern Ireland as he insisted stable devolved government could deliver an economic windfall for the region.

In a keynote address at Ulster University in Belfast, Mr Biden praised the work of the UK and EU to strike the Windsor Framework on post-Brexit trading arrangements.

The president’s visit to Northern Ireland comes as the region marks the 25th anniversary of the landmark Good Friday Agreement that created Stormont’s powersharing institutions.

The DUP, which is currently blocking those institutions in protest at Brexit trade barriers between Britain and Northern Ireland, has said the framework does not go far enough to address its concerns over sovereignty.

Mr Biden met with Stormont’s political leaders before making the speech at the university’s new campus in Belfast city centre.

Earlier, he had a 45-minute meeting with British prime minster Rishi Sunak at a Belfast hotel.

“As a friend, I hope it’s not too presumptuous for me to say that I believe the democratic institutions established in Good Friday Agreement remain critical for the future of Northern Ireland,” said the President.

US President Joe Biden arrives to deliver his keynote speech at Ulster University in Belfast. Picture: Aaron Chown/PA Wire

“It’s a decision for you to make, not for me to make, but it seems to me they are related. An effective devolved government that reflects the people of Northern Ireland and is accountable to them, a government that works to find ways through hard problems together, is going to draw even greater opportunity in this region.

“So, I hope the assembly and the executive will soon be restored. That’s a judgement for you to make, not me, but I hope it happens, along with the institutions that facilitate north south and east west relations, all of which are vital pieces of the Good Friday Agreement.

“For in politics, no matter what divides us, if we look hard enough, there are always areas that’s going to bring us together if we look hard enough. Standing for peace and rejecting political violence must be one of those things.”

Good Friday Agreement

Standing in the newly-built Ulster University campus, Mr Biden said such a glass-fronted building would have been “highly unlikely” during one of his previous visits to the area in 1991, when the Troubles were raging.

Terrorist bombs destroyed scores of buildings in Belfast during the 1970s, 80s and 90s, with one hotel, the Europa, even dubbed the most bombed hotel in Europe.

“This very campus is situated at an intersection where conflict and bloodshed once held a terrible sway,” Mr Biden said.

The idea to have a glass building here when I was here in ’91 was highly unlikely.

“Where barbed wire once sliced up the city, today we find a cathedral of learning built of glass and let the light shine in and out.

“This has a profound impact for someone who has come back to see it.

“It’s an incredible testament to the power and the possibilities of peace.” Speaking on the 25th anniversary of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, Mr Biden paid tribute to the peace makers.

This included “pioneering women who said ‘enough’ and demanded change”, political leaders, and the “determined efforts” of his “good friend” Senator George Mitchell to bring about the accord.

“His time serving as special envoy for Northern Ireland is one of the great examples in history of the right person for the right job at the right time, in my view,” Mr Biden said of Mr Mitchell.

“I think sometimes, especially with the distance of history, we forget how hard-earned, how astounding that peace was. It shifted the political gravity in our world.

“In 1998 it was the longest-running conflict in Europe since the end of World War Two – thousands of families had been affected by the Troubles, losses are real, the pain was personal.

“Every person killed in the Troubles left an empty chair at the dining room table, a hole in the heart that was never filled for the ones they lost.

“Peace was not inevitable, we can’t ever forget that. As George Mitchell often said, the negotiations had 700 days of failure, and one day of success, but they kept going because George and all the many others never stopped believing that success was possible.

“I want all of you, especially the young people, to know the American people are with you, every step of the way.”