Your editorial (10 April) on the Good Friday agreement points out that “it did not get rid of sectarianism” and that two decades on “the two traditions remain entrenched”. If the “share of the Northern Ireland vote won by parties not defined by sectarian loyalty has barely changed in the past 20 years”, this must be seen as a direct consequence of the agreement, not an accident. It may have been necessary at the time, but by insisting, as your paper has noted, that any “devolved government would comprise a cross-community partnership in which unionists and nationalists would share power”, the 1998 settlement has in practice served not to challenge sectarianism but to manage it. Hence it is hardly surprising that subsequent elections in Northern Ireland have seen the voters of each “community” selecting the party most likely to champion its interests vis-a-vis the other side. The institutions as they stand leave no space for those who might not wish to define themselves as unionist or nationalist. In practice, opting for a non-sectarian party would, given the terms of the agreement, be a wasted vote. Surely it is time for this to change.

Declan O’Neill

Oldham

• Hillary Clinton is correct to say that a reinstated hard border in Ireland would be an “enormous setback” (Don’t let Brexit undermine Ireland’s peace, 10 April). She needn’t be unduly worried. As Bertie Ahern, without complacency, told the BBC’s Newsnight, if border infrastructure was restored “people would just physically pull it down – the ordinary people”. Some fools in Northern Ireland’s unionist community and some evil people among dissident republicans may, for very different reasons, wish to countenance a hard border – one side because they believe it will help shore up their precious union with Britain, the other side because they wish to restart an old war. However, the former taoiseach and one of the architects of the Good Friday agreement is right. The normal decent people of Ireland, the vast majority of us, simply won’t stand for its return.

Joe McCarthy

Dublin

• It was good to read Hillary Clinton’s insightful comments on the 20th anniversary of that far-reaching Good Friday agreement, which has had a profound affect on peace and prosperity in Ireland. It has an almost “sacred cow” veracity about it and its very toppling could indeed be disastrous. She is correct that the implications of Brexit and the intransigent views of our leading rightwing Brexiters cannot be allowed to dismantle all that has been achieved. Power sharing has admittedly stalled and this is a great shame, but if Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley could be brought together in harmony, nothing is impossible or indeed off the table of rapprochement and constructive action.

Judith Daniels

Great Yarmouth, Norfolk

• David Davis shows poor understanding of Irish politics in suggesting Leo Varadkar is strongly influenced by Sinn Féin. It would be a sure way for his Fine Gael party to lose support. It seems little more than a desperate effort to deflect the grip in which the DUP hold the Conservatives. Though I regret the UK vote, I sympathise with some of the arguments. This process began as one man’s effort to save his job before morphing into a campaign fuelled by ultimately discredited anti-European “facts”. It is now perpetuated by a naive or deliberate lack of accuracy. The British people, the Irish and the ordinary working citizens of Europe deserve better than this.

Michael O’Leary

Dublin

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