{"id":665256,"date":"2025-12-31T19:05:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T19:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/665256\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T19:05:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T19:05:15","slug":"british-government-office-in-belfast-was-on-the-side-of-sinn-fein-and-dublin-over-brexit-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/665256\/","title":{"rendered":"British government office in Belfast was \u2018on the side\u2019 of Sinn Fein and Dublin over Brexit \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Northern Ireland Office was \u201con the side of the Irish government and Sinn F\u00e9in\/IRA,\u201d during the Brexit negotiations, Boris Johnson\u2019s<\/a> former top adviser has claimed. <\/p>\n

Best known as the mastermind behind the divisive 2016 Brexit campaign and for being at the centre of the political drama that followed the pandemic, Dominic Cummings <\/a>made the comments on the Quite Right! podcast with the former Cabinet Minister Michael Gove.<\/p>\n

First discussing \u201clawfare\u201d from the UK government against British troops, he talked of how members of the SAS were celebrated for \u201ctaking down the IRA\u201d in the 1980s and early 1990s.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were given medals for the operations, Mrs Thatcher went and visited them and said \u2018brilliant job in extremely difficult circumstances, well done you\u2019re all heroes.\u2019<\/p>\n

\"State<\/a>\"‘A<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe exact same people are now being told in their 70s, \u2018you\u2019re going to have to lawyer up and find money from somewhere because you may be facing murder charges.\u2019<\/p>\n

He then claimed the Northern Ireland Office was \u201con the side of the Irish Government and Sinn F\u00e9in\/IRA\u201d during the Brexit negotiations, as well as stating longstanding elements within Ministry of Defence \u201cwhich have always hated special forces.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"FormerFormer prime minister Boris Johnson pictured with his ex-chief adviser Dominic Cummings. PICTURE: VICTORIA JONES\/PA <\/p>\n

\u201cRemember, immediately after World War Two the SAS was closed and other special entities and had to be revived later to deal with various disasters going on.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo there\u2019s longstanding hatred and opposition to the very concept of British special forces in much of Whitehall.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking back at his time advising Boris Johnson during the pandemic, he said \u201ca complete state failure\u201d made the first lockdown in early 2020 necessary \u2013 but subsequent lockdowns could have been avoided if a proper test and trace system was established.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the NIO said: \u201cWe categorically reject these claims. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey are nonsense and do not reflect the NIO\u2019s steadfast work on behalf of all the people and communities of Northern Ireland.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reacting to the interview, the Ulster Unionist MLA Steve Aiken commented: \u201cThat perspective of the NIO will not be a surprise to virtually no one. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe undue influence of the (Irish foreign ministry) is clear to everyone who has sat at various meetings in castles and houses across the land. <\/p>\n

\u201cCan\u2019t think of anyone in the UUP or even DUP who thinks differently.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Northern Ireland Office was \u201con the side of the Irish government and Sinn F\u00e9in\/IRA,\u201d during the Brexit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665257,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5226],"tags":[5109,802,748,60193,2000,299,5187,1699,4884,143850,2887,285,11528,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-665256","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brexit","8":"tag-boris-johnson","9":"tag-brexit","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-dominic-cummings","12":"tag-eu","13":"tag-europe","14":"tag-european","15":"tag-european-union","16":"tag-great-britain","17":"tag-nio","18":"tag-pandemic","19":"tag-politics","20":"tag-sinn-fein","21":"tag-uk","22":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115815745245455259","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665256\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}