As seen from Waterloo, it's a model for Catalan self-determination. But it is not Quebec or the Canadian Supreme Court's Clarity Act. Nor is it Montenegro and a 55% vote for 'yes' as a way of validating independence. And neither is it Scotland, despite the 2014 referendum. In fact, the model of self-determination on which Catalan president-in-exile Carles Puigdemont is focused as he seeks an "historic commitment" to overcome the Catalonia-Spain political conflict is that of Northern Ireland and the Good Friday Agreement (GFA). This is the belief of the central core of the exiled Catalan president's advisors, who are working with elements and principles of the historic accord, also known as the Belfast Agreement, in efforts to focus a useful negotiation with the Spanish state, according to sources consulted by ElNacional.cat.
The agreement of April 10th, 1998 ended 30 years of bloody conflict in Northern Ireland and put the future of the territory, still an integral part of the United Kingdom, on track, with self-determination as a key to the political and constitutional pact. The accord allowed all parties to see their proposals recognized, even though they were diametrically opposed, because the text made them dependent on the will of the citizens. This was the heart of the consensus.
Apart from the obvious differences between the cases of Northern Ireland and Catalonia, the question is extremely important at a time when self-determination is part - in a second phase - of the road map that Carles Puigdemont sketched out in a major speech in Brussels on September 5th. The first part of the route that he set out includes the preconditions for the pro-independence Together for Catalonia (Junts) party to give its support to the investiture of Pedro Sánchez as Spanish prime minister, including an amnesty for those prosecuted in the independence process. But beyond these lines, the team closest to Puigdemont particularly appreciates that the Good Friday Agreement, a marvel of political, legal and diplomatic engineering, hinges politically on the absolute respect for the will of the citizens with regard to their future, whether it is for Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom - as it has done for the 25 years since the agreement - or for it to join the rest of Ireland at some time in the future.
The Northern Ireland case constitutes an example, admittedly not often cited in political and legal debate, of the application of the right to self-determination in Western Europe in a territory that international law does not consider colonial, as is also the case with Catalonia and with Euskadi (the Basque Country). This questions the thesis of those who rule out that this principle can be applied to the nationalities of the Spanish state because self-determination is only recognized and applied in situations of colonialism, as occurred during the wave of decolonization in the 1960s and 1970s.
The 1916 Easter Rising: Ireland's UDI
Ireland has historically been present in the collective imagination of Catalan and Basque nationalisms since the Easter Rising of 1916 against British rule, led by Sinn Féin nationalists and the first Irish Republican Army (IRA). The Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) made in the General Post Office in Dublin, occupied by Irish patriots, did not end - unlike Catalonia's 2017 independence declaration - in direct rule and repression, but rather in the creation of the Irish Free State (1921), still within the British Commonwealth. However, while the agreement with London provided self-government for the Irish, it also divided the island between the predominantly Catholic south, with its capital in Dublin, and six northeastern counties with their capital in Belfast. That is, a northern territory including most of the historic province of Ulster, with a Protestant and unionist majority population and a Catholic and Irish nationalist minority which favours unification of the island. Both parts of the island, the north with British sovereignty and the free Irish land of the south, were given their own parliaments, although the unionist regime in the north excluded Catholics from government, voting, education and home ownership. The 1920s pact with London for self-government was accepted only by a part of the Irish nationalist movement, which in turn unleashed a civil war within the movement itself.
In 1949, the current Republic of Ireland was created, which maintained its claim to the northeastern counties under British rule. In the late 1960s, in Northern Ireland, a pro-civil rights revolt led to the revival of the IRA and a renewed Sinn Féin, as well as the rise of unionist and loyalist militias linked to unionist parties and with shadowy connections to the police. The occupation of the territory by the British army, and its direct rule from London, with the suspension of the autonomous parliament in 1972, as well as police repression and judicial arbitrariness, placed the region in a state of permanent war. The IRA also frequently attacked in Britain itself. In 1998, when the negotiations that would result in the Good Friday Agreement began, the armed conflict known euphemistically as The Troubles had caused 3,250 deaths and more than 40,000 injuries in Northern Ireland. The final number of fatalities in all scenarios exceeded 3,500.
Mediators: Clinton and Mitchell
In his Brussels speech, Puigdemont set out four preconditions for an investiture of the next Spanish prime minister. There was the recognition of the legitimacy of independence, the end of repression and the amnesty, but after that, the Catalan president-in-exile mentioned "the creation of a mediation and verification mechanism to provide guarantees of compliance and monitoring of agreements that the two major Spanish political parties are not in a position to give us". This fourth condition was intended to establish that the framework of international treaties on human rights and fundamental freedoms would be the sole limits on the negotiation. In fact, a quarter of a century ago, the extremely difficult peace negotiations in Northern Ireland were sponsored by the United States, which exercised a very direct mediation with all parties through president Bill Clinton's special envoy, the former Democratic senator and businessman George Mitchell, author of a six-point proposal that made the agreement and participation of all actors subject to the abandonment of violence and the use of strictly political and democratic means. Clinton made a personal commitment to it, to the point of visiting Belfast to encourage the process. And Mitchell, who was assisted by the retired former Canadian general Jean de Chastelain and the former Finnish prime minister Harri Holkeri, presided over the negotiating sessions with a very active role. A role that far surpasses that of the "rapporteur" which was mentioned but never defined in the creation of the dialogue table between the Spanish and Catalan governments, which met for the first time in February 2020.
Under Mitchell's leadership, the Northern Ireland talks at Stormont, the seat of British rule in Belfast, brought together the governments of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, whose prime ministers were then Labour's Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern of the Fianna Fáil (the Irish republic's most important party), alongside political representatives of the two opposing national communities: the unionists, with David Trimble of the Ulster Unionist Party as the main leader - the radical loyalist reverend Ian Paisley excluded himself - and the nationalists or republicans, represented by John Hume, leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, opposed to violence, and the key figure, the leader of Sinn Féin, Gerry Adams — always in contact with the person considered head of the IRA, Martin McGuinness — as well as some smaller parties. Dialogue moved forward in fits and starts due to the pressure of the paramilitaries and the Orange unionist parades through Catholic neighbourhoods, but in the end it came to fruition.
Hume and Trimble received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998. But the end of terrorism in Northern Ireland was not possible without first untying the central knot of the conflict, in terms of sovereignty, with self-determination as the keystone. Disarmament, the release of prisoners and human rights all depended, in the end, on the understanding between governments, parties and communities on the political future of the territory in accordance with respect for the majority will of the citizens. For this reason, Puigdemont's team is paralleling the approach of the Good Friday Agreement in terms of self-determination. In the case of Euskadi, the Irish model did have an influence on the negotiations that in 2011 brought an end to the violence of ETA - which operated for 50 years with no small number of ties to the IRA, while its political arm, HB, had links to Sinn Féin - without the peace process producing changes in the Basque Country's political status. However, in the case of the Catalonia-Spain conflict, with a strictly political dimension, without the presence of any factor of violence, the handling of the self-determination question applied to Ireland could be a reference point offering valid elements in order to agree on political solutions. A model that, logically, could also be applied to a Euskadi which is now without ETA and in which the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) - at risk of losing its hegemony to the left-wing, pro-independence EH Bildu, the party led by Arnaldo Otegi, the Basque Country's Gerry Adams - is moving politically closer to Puigdemont.
What does the GFA say about self-determination?
So, just what does the Good Friday Agreement say about self-determination? The Anglo-Irish Agreement which was signed in 1985 by the British prime minister, the conservative Margaret Thatcher, and the Taoiseach or Irish prime minister, Garret FitzGerald, of the right-wing Fine Gael party, recognized that any change in the the status of Northern Ireland could only be achieved by a consensus with majority support from the territory's population. That agreement between Whitehall and Dublin, however, did not please either the unionists or the nationalists. Unionism stuck to the principle that the future of Northern Ireland should be decided solely by the Northern Irish - which guaranteed the continuity of British sovereignty - while the Irish nationalists, in turn, insisted that all Irish people (from both the north and the south) should make the decision, which would guarantee the unification of Ireland. However, at that time, and with the Catholic priest Alec Reid building bridges for dialogue, the moderate nationalist Hume began an approach to Adams that in 1992 would lead Sinn Féin to offer a more open self-determination proposal in the quest for peace.
It was the end of the Cold War and the rise of the new Europe. And in this climate came the Downing Street Declaration, signed on December 15th, 1993 by Thatcher's Conservative Party successor, John Major, and his Irish counterpart Albert Reynolds, of Fianna Fáil, and it was a deal that laid the groundwork for the Good Friday Agreement five years later. In that statement, the UK undertook to "uphold the democratic wish of a greater number of the people of Northern Ireland on the issue of whether they prefer to support the Union or a sovereign united Ireland". But, at the same time, it recognizes that "it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone, by agreement between the two parts respectively, to exercise their right of self-determination on the basis of consent, freely and concurrently given, North and South, to bring about a united Ireland, if that is their wish.” (Point 4). For its part, the Irish government accepted that "the democratic right of self-determination by the people of Ireland as a whole must be achieved and exercised with and subject to the agreement and consent of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland (...)” (Point 5). It is what some experts called "concurrent self-determination" which makes the agreement dependent on the democratic will of both the North and the South with the endorsement of the two states involved.
The Downing Street Declaration created the conditions for the multi-party Good Friday Agreement with actors from Northern Ireland and the US as facilitators and guarantors of the terms for the understanding. In its first block, under the heading of "Constitutional Issues", the Agreement states that the conclusions will be embodied in a new British-Irish Agreement that will replace the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985. The fact that self-determination is the basis on which the pact unfolds is shown by the fact that the entire opening chapter is devoted to the issue.
Thus, in Point 1.i) of the Good Friday Agreement, the legitimacy of "whatever choice" freely made by the citizens of Northern Ireland is recognized, whether to continue maintaining the union with the United Kingdom or to integrate into a united and sovereign Ireland. Point 1.ii) specifies that "it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone, by agreement between the two parts respectively and without external impediment, to exercise their right of self-determination on the basis of consent, freely and concurrently given, North and South, to bring about a united Ireland, if that is their wish, accepting that this right must be achieved and exercised with and subject to the agreement and consent of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland".
However, Northern Ireland's status as part of the United Kingdom is also reaffirmed. Point 1.iii), without ceasing to recognize the legitimacy of the Northern Ireland people who want the unification of the island, a will coinciding with that of the majority of the Irish in the south, underlines that "the present wish" of the majority, "freely exercised and legitimate, is the maintenance of the union with the United Kingdom. A union that, again, is based on free consent: "Northern Ireland’s status as part of the United Kingdom reflects and relies upon that wish". In addition, both states stand as guarantors of the agreement by committing themselves to make it possible legislatively to make the wish for a unified Ireland a reality if the people want it. They will also ensure that whatever the final situation, the sovereign government's powers over the territory shall be exercised "with rigorous impartiality" and with respect for all people "in the diversity of their identities and traditions".
Irish, British or both nationalities
Along with self-determination and respect for the majority as a fundamental principle, the Good Friday Agreement also regulates the always-controversial question of the future nationality of the citizens of the territory whose sovereignty is disputed. Regarding this, the text is very clear (Point 1.vi). Thus, all signatories will recognize "the birthright of all the people of Northern Ireland to identify themselves and be accepted as Irish or British, or both"; "and, accordingly" - it adds -"they confirm that their right to hold both British and Irish citizenship is accepted by both Governments and would not be affected by any future change in the status of Northern Ireland". That is, citizens of Northern Ireland will be able to define thmselves as only Irish, only British or both, and both the United Kingdom and Ireland guarantee this for all purposes.
Constitutional compatibility and guarantees
The signatory governments of the Good Friday Agreement also undertook to reflect the changes that occur in Northern Ireland both in the constitution of the Republic of Ireland and in British legislation (Point 2). In addition, they also specified how to apply electoral mandates if the population decided to separate from the United Kingdom and join the rest of Ireland. Thus, Annex A of the agreement, referring to clauses and annexes to be incorporated into the laws of the United Kingdom, establishes in its first point that Northern Ireland "remains in its entirety as part of the United Kingdom" and will not cease to be so "without the consent of the majority of the people of Northern Ireland voting in a poll held for this purpose". In Point 2, and in the event that the majority decides to cease to be part of the United Kingdom and join a unified Ireland, the British secretary for Northern Ireland is tasked with presenting proposals to the British Parliament "to give effect to that wish as may be agreed" between the UK and Irish governments. The constitutional compatibility of the agreement contrasts powerfully with the refusal of all Spanish governments to address the issue of self-determination of its "nationalities", whose existence is recognized although without naming them, by article 2 of the current Spanish Constitution.
The Good Friday Agreement created a Northern Ireland Assembly and a government shared by the two communities; a North-South Ministerial Council, the first joint governing body for the entire island; a British-Irish Council whose members, in addition to the governments of London and Dublin, are those of Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland - territories to which the devolution or territorial reform of the Blair government was also applied - as well as the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man; and, finally, a British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference linking the two states and the two islands, Great Britain and Ireland. In short, the Good Friday solution reconfigured the distribution of territorial power, and ultimately, sovereignties, throughout the British and Irish space.
Promotion of the Irish language
Of course, the agreement includes a very important section on respect for human rights and international conventions, which include issues of an economic, social and cultural nature, and among them the promotion of the language, Irish, which has recently achieved full official European language status. A status that Junts and ERC have also claimed for Catalan, Basque and Galician, in the negotiations opened following the general election of July 23rd and that the Spanish government has already defended, although the decision has been postponed due to reservations among some countries.
The surrender of weapons, the overhaul of the criminal justice system and the release of prisoners completed the historic agreement. All the provisions of the pact are summarized in a general annex that commits the two governments, in London and Dublin, to implement it. In short, the legitimacy of any option freely exercised by the majority, the right of self-determination "on the basis of the consent, freely and concurrently granted, by the North and the South to create a united Ireland if they so wish", maintenance at present of the Union by the wish of the majority...
Concurrent self-determination and referendums
The people of the north and south of Ireland were summoned to validate the consequences of the Good Friday Agreement in separate referendums. In Northern Ireland, 'yes' to the agreement won with 71.12%, versus 28.88% for 'no'; and in the Republic of Ireland, where the amendment to the Constitution on self-determination was voted, 94.39% of the votes were affirmative and 5.61% negative. Thus, concurrent self-determination as a cornerstone that put the Northern Ireland conflict on track began to be applied immediately. And it was enshrined in Article 1 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, the British law that reflects the agreement, as well as in the Irish Constitution. Carles Puigdemont, in his September 5th address in Brussels, did not ask for self-determination as a condition sine qua non for Junts to support a Spanish president, but he did place it as the arrival point of the agreement or historic commitment that he is proposing to the powers of the Spanish state to resolve the Catalonia-Spain political conflict.