In the No camp

Monday's Wall Street Journal Europe (subs. req'd) joins the slowly emerging ranks (see the evolving links on Slugger O'Toole) of those striking a discordant note about Friday's update of the Good Friday Agreement, the St Andrews Agreement (sic). The WSJ was never a fan of the GFA, and its opinions on Northern Ireland have in recent years been coloured by an attempted bracketing of the IRA in the Global War on Terror. Anyway, the WSJ has 2 complaints about the new proposals: that they reward the hard men, and they dodge the issue of IRA decommissioning while cementing Sinn Fein control over policing --

Giving a former terrorist [Martin McGuinness] such a prominent post would cement the legacy of the Good Friday agreement as one that bolstered extremists at the expense of moderates ... It's difficult to foresee a long, happy future for a government headed by two bitter enemies [Paisley]. The practical aspects of how this odd couple would work together have yet to be explained, or perhaps even explored. What's worse, the continued ascendancy of the extremists could snuff out support for the moderates. This is supposed to be the basis for a lasting peace?

... Sinn Fein is demanding the immediate transfer of oversight of the [police] force to Belfast from London. And here's the kicker: When that happens, the minister in charge of the police could be a member of Sinn Fein ... Though the IRA claims to have forsworn violence, it still has not given up its arms in a way that can be verified. The people of Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and Britain can hardly rest easy without a proper decommissioning of IRA weapons. Until that happens, Sinn Fein can't be considered an honest political broker.

The latter complaint seems poorly grounded given the effort that has gone into verified decommissioning and in light of the transfer of key police intelligence functions to MI5, away from any ministerial influence in Belfast. But the agreement does leave a sense that intransigence has been rewarded, and one wonders how Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is planning on containing any spillover effects in the Republic from what will clearly be played as a victory by Sinn Fein north of the border.