Irish leader pans warning from Pelosi

U.S. House Speaker suggested U.K. trade deal at risk if Britain scraps N. Ireland peace protocol

LONDON U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is facing criticism from the leader of Northern Ireland’s biggest unionist party after saying Congress won’t approve a trade deal with the U.K. if Britain scraps the agreement governing post-Brexit trade on the Irish island.

The transatlantic sparring follows British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government’s announcement that it intends to introduce legislation that would allow it to unilaterally suspend the Northern Ireland Protocol, an international agreement between Britain and the European Union.

Northern Ireland is the only part of the U.K. that shares a land border with an EU country — the Republic of Ireland — and required special attention when the U.K. withdrew from the EU.

The protocol is designed to preserve the Northern Ireland peace process, but unionists complain it has created a trade barrier between the province and the rest of the U.K.

Pelosi said Thursday that Britain’s actions threatened to undermine the 1998 Good Friday Accords that ended decades of violence in Northern Ireland. She called for “good-faith negotiations” to resolve any differences over the protocol.

“As I have stated in my conversations with the prime minister, the foreign secretary and members of the House of Commons, if the United Kingdom chooses to undermine the Good Friday Accords, the Congress cannot and will not support a bilateral free trade agreement with the United Kingdom,” Pelosi said.

Johnson’s spokesperson, Jamie Davies, said the U.K. remains committed to reaching an agreement with the EU and has invited the bloc’s Brexit chief, Maros Sefcovic, for talks.

“We welcome that the U.S. shares our deep commitment to the Belfast Good Friday Agreement and the peace process and has urged the EU to show flexibility,” Davies said.

Jeffrey Donaldson, a member of Parliament and leader of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, said the protocol itself is undermining the peace process because it threatens the key principles of the Good Friday Accords.

“If Nancy Pelosi wants to see the agreement protected, then she needs to recognize that it is the protocol that is harming and undermining the agreement,” he said.