On Wednesday, U.S. President Joseph Biden will meet British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Northern Irish political leaders in Belfast to commemorate Northern Ireland’s 1998 peace treaty.
Biden, proud of his Irish background, will spend little over half a day in the U.K. before heading south to Ireland for two-and-a-half days of speeches and meetings with officials and distant relatives.
Biden told reporters before departing Washington that he wanted to “maintain the peace” as Northern Ireland commemorates the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which ended 30 years of conflict between Catholic opponents and Protestant supporters of British authority.
He also pledged to preserve the Windsor Framework arrangement between the E.U. and Britain to reduce post-Brexit economic obstacles between Northern Ireland and the rest of the U.K.
The region’s strongest pro-British party, the DUP, has refused to withdraw its boycott of the devolved power-sharing administration, a fundamental pillar of the 1998 peace settlement.
The DUP says the first visit, the U.S. president’s first president in 10 years, would not compel it to halt its more than year-long protest against trade regulations that treat the province differently from the rest of the U.K.
Biden is due to welcome DUP and the other four main Northern Ireland political groups, although it is unclear if they will meet separately.
On his arrival, Biden will suggest deeper U.S.-Northern Ireland investment links to break the deadlock.
After his Ulster University address and meeting with Sunak, Biden will visit County Louth, where his great-grandfather was born, midway between Belfast and Dublin. Wednesday will be stormy.
On Friday, Biden will visit relatives in Mayo.
Biden’s great-great-grandfather, County Louth shoemaker Owen Finnegan, emigrated to the U.S. in 1849. Around 1850, his family—including Biden’s great-grandfather James Finnegan—followed him.
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