Trimble and Foster unite to call for removal of Brexit backstop

Former Northern Ireland first minister David Trimble is taking the UK government to court with a claim that the Brexit withdrawal agreement’s Irish backstop clause breaches the Good Friday Agreement.

Nobel Peace Prize-winner Trimble, who played a major role in the 1998 Irish peace deal, is planning on launching judicial proceedings to force the UK government to drop the backstop clause which was set in place by the European Union to avoid a hard border in Ireland.

A crowdfunding, in association with the Global Britain thinktank, is in place to support the legal case against the Withdrawal deal that, according to Trimble, “encroaches” on the Belfast agreement.

“The government has forgotten that there are two agreements – and both are comparable to treaties,” Trimble said.

“And you look at the law of treaties and there is a very clear principle there that if a treaty has been made by certain parties, and another encroaches on it, then the encroachment is unlawful. The first treaty takes precedence.”

Lord Trimble told BBC radio that the Brexit agreement “turns the Belfast Agreement on its head and does serious damage to it.”

Furthermore, Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party, which props up Theresa May's government in Westminster, also stepped up its objections to the backstop.

The DUP has long opposed this clause since it would create a hard border down the Irish Sea and would separate Northern Ireland from the rest of the UK and would risk the region being locked into EU regulations indefinitely.

DUP leader Arlene Foster said "parliament's mandate is to replace the backstop", reiterating her position that its existence "is toxic to those of us living in Northern Ireland,” she told the BBC.

“If the backstop is dealt with in the withdrawal agreement then, despite the fact we may have misgivings around other parts of the withdrawal agreement, we will support the Prime Minister because we do want Brexit to happen in an orderly and sustained fashion,” she said.

The EU has repeatedly stated it will not go back to the negotiating table to renegotiate a new deal but could work around the existing one.

In her contribution to the debate, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the Brexit impasse could be broken but it required creativity.

“From a political point of view, there is still time,” Merkel told an economic conference in Tokyo on Tuesday. “That should be used by all sides. But for this it would be very important to know what exactly the British side envisages in terms of its relationship with the EU,” she said.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May will make a speech in Northern Ireland on Tuesday on the Withdrawal Agreement to calm the fears on the backstop and will meet with Northern Irish leaders on Wednesday before travelling to meet EU leaders on Thursday.