The British government’s effort to salvage its contentious policy of deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda is drawing attention from the White House, which wants to make sure any revamped legislation does not undermine the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, according to two Biden administration officials.
“Definitely all keeping an eye on Northern Ireland,” said a senior official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
That a British immigration policy involving one-way flights to an East African country would have implications for Northern Ireland is one of the strange, second-order effects of Britain’s membership in the European Convention on Human Rights, an international accord it helped draft after World War II.
And the fact that it would catch the eye of Washington speaks to the sensitivity of Northern Ireland in the trans-Atlantic relationship.
President Biden, a proud Irish American, has shown a keen interest in the Good Friday Agreement, which was brokered under another Democratic president, Bill Clinton, and ended decades of sectarian strife.
Persons:
”, Biden, Bill Clinton
Organizations:
White, Biden, Human Rights, Irish, Democratic
Locations:
British, Rwanda, Northern Ireland, East, Washington