Irish ambassador tells UK open Irish border is "essential"

LONDON, Dec. 5 (Xinhua) -- The Irish ambassador to Britain said on Tuesday that a continued open border between Northern Ireland and Ireland after Brexit was "essential" for peace.

Brexit negotiations between Britain and the European Union (EU) were halted on Monday just as both sides appeared to have reached an agreement over how to deal with Britain's only land border with an EU state.

However, the talks fell apart on Monday afternoon after British Prime Minister Theresa May was told by Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) that it did not back May.

DUP leader Arlene Foster said that it did not support May's deal on the future of the Irish border.

The agreement May believed she had reached on Monday lunchtime was no longer available after a phone conversation with Foster.

Foster's DUP agreed over the summer after the general election to support May's minority government, and May relies on the support of its ten MPs to stay in power.

Adrian O'Neill, Irish ambassador to Britain, said on Tuesday afternoon at a briefing at the Institute for Government (IFG) in London: "An open border is essential to protect the peace process and the Good Friday Agreement."

He added: "For us it is about maintaining the status quo about making sure we avoid any hardening of the border in Ireland. That has been the objective of the Irish government since the Brexit referendum."

The border between Ireland and Northern Ireland was a hard border but developments in 1992 and then the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) of 1998, which brought peace to Northern Ireland after the decades-long Troubles, ended that.

O'Neill said that there was now "an open and invisible border, that is a consequence of the single market in 1992."

The GFA meant that the security installations of the British Army were dismantled.

"That is a huge leap in progress in terms of bringing communities together, it was a huge facilitator of normalization of arrangements on the island of Ireland," said O'Neill.

The Irish government had been involved in negotiations for a solution to the border issue over the past few days between Ireland, Britain and the EU, O'Neill confirmed.

These discussions centered on the text of a document and the Irish Cabinet had met on Monday morning and backed that text, said O'Neill.

"A good deal of progress had been made on that text and there were a couple of outstanding issues on Sunday and a Cabinet meeting was called on Monday morning to look at that text and get the approval of the Irish government," added O'Neill.

He added: "That was secured and as the toaiseach (Irish prime minister) indicated he got a call from President Juncker (president of the European Commission) and President Tusk (president of the European Council) to confirm the agreement of the UK. And it was full speed ahead."

O'Neill said that the Irish government saw in that document a "clean and firm commitment to avoid a hard border" with Northern Ireland.

This would be achieved through an overall future agreement between the EU and Britain, he said. Enditem