LAST UPDATE | 3 May
SINN FÉIN FIRST Minister Michelle O’Neill said Simon Harris’s first official visit to the North as Taoiseach was a “good opportunity to underline our commitment to the A5″.
Harris today met with O’Neill and DUP deputy first minister Emma Little-Pengelly for talks focused around areas of shared economic collaboration.
On Tuesday, teenagers Kamile Vaicikonyte and Jamie Moore died in a road traffic collision on the A5 in Co Tyrone.
A day before Vaicikonyte’s death, she had taken part in a school protest calling for the A5 to be upgraded.
Since September 2016, 56 people have lost their life on the road.
Earlier this year, the Irish Government pledged €600 million to the proposed upgrade of the A5 road.
Speaking today after Harris’s visit, O’Neill pointed to the A5 as one of the many areas of shared collaboration.
She said: “I am very glad he (Harris) has taken the opportunity to be here early in his tenure to talk about the areas of shared collaboration, particularly around areas that the Irish Government have already identified, particularly around the Shared Island Fund.
“A good opportunity to again underline our commitment to the A5, particularly given the week that’s been and two more young people tragically losing their lives on that very dangerous stretch of road.
“Clearly a lot of areas of opportunity for advancement, particularly now that we have the north-south ministerial bodies back up and working again.”
She added: “We talked about some of those areas of economic development, we talked about the opportunities we have in terms of pursuing a lot of these big infrastructure projects.”
Meanwhile, after a meeting lasting just short of an hour, Harris praised the “incredible leadership” of O’Neill and Little-Pengelly during a brief press conference at which there was limited scope for the media to ask questions.
“It has been a really good engagement,” said Harris.
“I was eager to get here in the early stages of my tenure as Taoiseach because we now have institutions back up and running in the north.
“I am very grateful to the First Minister and deputy First Minister for the incredible leadership they are showing in the political environment in terms of trying to deliver for people and I’m extraordinarily pleased the Irish Government is in a position to work, where appropriate, on a range of issues.
“I think we have an impressive list of areas where we are now actively co-operating and collaborating in.”
Powersharing returned in the North in February following a 24-month hiatus.
Elsewhere, Little-Pengelly said she “highlighted the fact that relationships, particularly between unionism and the Taoiseach’s office, have not always been good in the last number of years”.
She added: “But we look forward to building a more positive relationship, an engagement which is based with respect to that stranded approach in respect with the internal issues of Northern Ireland are those for the Government of Northern Ireland and for the United Kingdom.
“But there will be other areas where we will want to engage and the best way to do that is with that respect and also in building those positive relationships.
“The Republic of Ireland is our closest neighbour and of course we want to be good neighbours and have those positive working relationships.”
Harris then moved to Parliament Buildings where he was welcomed by the DUP’s Edwin Poots, the Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly. before holding talks with Stormont party leaders.
Afterwards, Alliance party leader Naomi Long said she raised the need for reforms of the Stormont institutions to remove the ability for any one party to collapse the institutions in the future.
She also raised the recent diplomatic tensions between the UK and Ireland over migration issues.
Long described the spat over the Rwanda scheme as a bit of a “phoney war” and also appeared to question the basis for the claim that 80% of asylum seekers recently arrived in the Republic of Ireland had entered from Northern Ireland.
“These aren’t figures that we would recognise,” Long said, as she stressed the need for clarity on the numbers.
She added: “Whilst we’re not responsible for migration in Northern Ireland (the Home Office is), we do have an ethical and moral obligation to look after people who are within our remit and in our jurisdiction.”
Meanwhile, Ulster Unionist Party leader Doug Beattie said he pressed Harris to do more on issues around the legacy of the Troubles, including setting up a public inquiry in Ireland into the Omagh bomb of 1998.
Beattie insisted there was no need for any “reset” of relations between his party and the Irish Government, insisting that the relationship had “never faltered”.
SDLP leader Colum Eastwood said much of his discussions with Harris concentrated on migration.
He said the Taoiseach made it “very clear” that an open border on the island of Ireland was “non negotiable”.
Eastwood said the “noises” coming from the UK Government over migration and Ireland were primarily motivated by a desire to shore up its support in the local and general elections.
“One thing that I think unites lots of people in the north of Ireland is the need to get rid of this Tory Government, so the sooner they call that election the better,” he added.
The trip to Belfast comes less than a month after Harris said people of his “generation” are “more familiar” with Berlin and Paris than they are with Belfast or Derry in the North.
Harris made the comments as he addressed the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly at Druids Glen Hotel in Newtown Mount Kennedy, Co Wicklow, last month.
Harris told the audience that there is a “whole generation of people who are yearning to be involved in a conversation about the future, in a conversation about how we work together”.
“I’m also, if I’m being very honest, of a generation where people are more familiar now with London and Berlin and Paris than they might be with Belfast or Derry,” he said.
“I think we really have to challenge ourselves – how do we actually make sure people on this island and these islands get to know each other better?”
-With additional reporting from Diarmuid Pepper and Press Association
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