[DemolitionRed]

Originally Posted by MTVN

Well throughout the Troubles there will have been government dialogue with the IRA and loyalist forces. That's what governments do but it's very different to the romantic platitudes that Corbyn's team have bestowed on the IRA in the past.

Surely even the most dogmatic of Corbyn supporters will accept that he was no neutral intermediary in the Troubles. He opposed the 1985 Anglo-Irish agreement specifically because it accepted Northern Ireland as part of the UK, something he could never support. To say that Sinn Fein were people he 'profoundly disagrees' with is just disingenuous. Maybe he could say that if he was also meeting with Ian Paisley and David Irvine but he never did, did he? As I've posted before, I've seen all of Corbyn's explanations, listened to the half-apologies given by McDonnell, and I am still unconvinced by them. Again, he uses the term 'friend' about Hamas while simultaenously arguing that Netanyahu be detained for war crimes and that the Israeli football team should not be allowed to play a match in Cardiff. If this is his idea of peacemaking then it is horribly imbalanced.

The problem is, there are so many blog writers like Anthony Breach and Steve Moore, (the later who writes on a personal emotional level) in breach of the real facts.

Sinn Fein is the second largest political party in NI. They are a party who have always fought for a ‘United Ireland.’ Corbyn has always been a staunch supporter for a ‘United Ireland’ and why not? Southern Ireland, who became independant in 1920 have peacefully co-exhisted (Catholics and Protestants). If Britain had, had the foresight to hand back the whole colony to the Irish people back in 1920, like they did with all the other colonies, then Britain and Ireland would of been friendly neighbors and none of this bloodshed would of happened.

What Corbyn didn’t support was the blood shed. Before his peace talks with Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams, he had, on numerous occasions condemned the bombings. Neither did he support the blood shed on Bloody Sunday and openly condemned the shooting of protestors.
The Anglo Irish Agreement was a huge stepping stone in bringing about the Good Friday Agreement and so what Corbyn’s political views regarding a ‘United’ or ‘Dis-United’ Northern Ireland are mute.

It was John Hume who started a public inquiry (something John Major had halted) into the deaths of protestors and passers by in the BS massacre and Corbyn, along with others, under the direct instructions from John Hume and Mo Mowlam were the men and women who instigated talks with Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams (not Ian Paisley and David Irvine because this was not a party political thing). Without all of these things, instigated by both the Tories and the Labour party, there would of been no agreement.