The Brexit is a mistake. This is hell

The front door of the Conlons has no case, and no bell. Behind the house is a couple of cows mooing in the barn, everything else is silent. The Knock on the door leads to a short period of uncertainty among the residents. From the front, just Strangers, and Strangers are rare in this area. The people, you know, in Drummully in the County of Monaghan, and who wants Tom Conlon visit, walking around, usually in the back.

Conlons wife opens after some Hesitation, the door-to-door, clear of knick-knacks from tables and chairs, and throwing fire wood into the cold fireplace. The mass in the Church is over, you are already been held in the morning at nine. Tom Conlon is 80 years old and no longer goes out a lot. The money he earns, still, with a Market stall for clothes and useful Stuff, but the market takes place on Saturdays.

The old man is not just a farmer and trader, he is also regarded as a regional Institution, and Amateur historian. Conlon knows: He is born here and owns Land on both sides of the border. "Ask Tom", had Noel Rafferty said in his house on the hill, although he also lived his whole life on the dividing line between the Republic of Ireland and the UK and has a very clear opinion of the whole misery. "The Brexit is a mistake. This is the hell. We are the victims."

"Quiet, not here."

"ask Tom", had the police officer come, who wishes to remain anonymous for security reasons and for 37 years at the border on duty, never more than ten kilometers away. Police forces and the army in Belfast and Dublin have already created comprehensive plans for the time after EU exit, says the official. Because "quiet, this is not here".

The great policy is actually a long way from Drummully, most of the neighbours here want to have anything to do with it. They talk to each other, but to Strangers covered. While you're in the middle. Conflicts in this area were at the border. Because the border was a reason for the conflicts – and it is. Especially here, in Drummully, this is all so present like nowhere else. The little patch of Land, eleven kilometres in length and three kilometers wide, known as Drummully Polyp or Drummully-tongue of land, extends in the Northern Irish County of Fermanagh, and of the border, with a few farms and sheep, a Church, a cemetery, and about 200 inhabitants.

pound and Euro in your wallet

It is a geographic feature, a Semi-enclave, which belongs to Ireland, but only from Northern Ireland, so from the UK. At the narrowest part of the Polyp opens just a hundred meters, the river Finn flows through it. On the second-narrowest part, a bridge. Noel Rafferty could about them, if he wanted to drive fast, a few Hundred metres to Tom Conlon for the Sunday visit.

"We our area, Locals have also used Drummully Republic called," says Conlon, and settles down in his armchair, "because we have considered always as a Special, stand-alone. The Locals in the area have good cooperating, no matter where you stood politically. Something else we could – because of the geography – never." If there had been Deaths during the civil war, "the Foreign goods".

image to enlarge

Conlons old friend Noel Rafferty Lives in his house behind the bridge, actually, in Northern Ireland or in Ireland? You had forgotten to ask him. But currently, just before the Brexit, would be the Yes also completely irrelevant; the limit exists since long in the virtual world. Rafferty, Conlon and the other neighbors, they all carry both of pounds as well as euros in your pocket. You have, because it allows the peace agreement of 1998, all of the Irish passport, and in part just, in addition to the UK, if you were born in the North. You go to the shopping to the North and to the doctor, to the South, and mostly only the very Old know where you are – strokes or over. Felt is all one. .

The border was already forgotten, become invisible. Northern Ireland and Ireland had grown with the launch of the European single market in 1993 and the peace agreement that ended the civil war, in breakneck speed. But for the past three years, since the Brexit Referendum, is the limit in the minds of back. All the talk about it. The Newspapers print special editions with maps and analysis. Economists are expecting what could be a cost whatsoever – inch border on the island of the economy.

Large majority for the soft limit

The Irish Prime Minister, Leo Varadkar, says it should never again be a mounted, visible border in Ireland. Well possible that it is different. The Boss of the total Irish Sinn Fein party, Mary Lou McDonald, who is fighting for re-unification of North and South, raged: "We Irish us not push it aside, so that the British can reach the imagination-Brexit, they salbadern constantly. There should be no hard limit, and we will defend the rights and protection granted to us the good Friday agreement." Well possible that you are mistaken.

What, according to the 29. March comes in? A hard Brexit, a soft Brexit, no Brexit? There will be the so-called Backstop, with the Northern Ireland virtually in the EU internal market would remain, to London and Brussels on a free trade agreement, have agreed? In London, the Backstop is so controversial among the members, that the whole agreement could fail.

Up on the probritische, Protestant DUP, Theresa May in London, the majority of them procured, in Northern Ireland, virtually everyone, that the Backstop comes as an insurance for peace and prosperity. In order for everything to remain as it is. But parts of the Tories and the DUP want to vote against it, because, they say, the special solution for Northern Ireland column of the Kingdom.

total crash is possible

so Far, Theresa May has her exit the contract – because of the Backstops – not by the house of Commons to get playing time. There should be a Deal at the last Minute, this would still customs checks necessary, no matter how elegant the solution is. It would have to at least give samples, mobile customs posts, perhaps, but also people controls to prevent illegal immigration, the police would have to combat smugglers. You could talk nicely, say Conlon and his neighbors. But the shared sense of threat is growing.

there Is no compromise in the lower house, it could even give a total crash, a withdrawal without a contract, because they owing in London promise and vertaktieren. In the EU-Commission in Brussels, the risk of a No is considered to Deal is currently extremely high. Thus, a classic customs border between the two countries would then be even back, with Items, controls, and drones, customs officers and police officers.

It threaten queues at the border

To the borders with the internal market fell, was the Drummully Polyp is example of law and lawlessness, for theory and practice, for insanity, and citizenship. Only two official positions have given it sooner in the East and West of the enclave, says Conlon. Finally, all had to be Yes – Irish, British, Northern Irish, civilians and military members – in the middle, the long way to avoid. The passage road, the Name switches constantly between N54 (Irish) and A3 (Northern Irish), was a "concession road", a kind of toll road without a toll. An hour, sometimes more, have you stood at the checkpoint, soldiers armed to the teeth. "We have made a Fun, the soldiers trick. Around behind the houses, on the farms," says Conlon.

The police had cordoned off the roads across the border with high Spikes, because the staff lacked, in order to control all of the trails With the bike and also with mules – came through it well. Roads that were intentionally bombed, were at night filled secretly. Conlon has a hunch that everything comes back. "The young Generation," he says, "has even less respect for authority than we do. And it will come back in the people looking for your opportunity: the smugglers, political, Cowboys, dreamers, the fight for the reunification. It is innate to the people that you want to be free." Since the Easter uprising of 1916, says Conlon thoughtful, fought many of his countrymen for an independent all-Ireland Republic. "Now the people are again receptive. With the Brexit, everything will start from the beginning."

In the Drummully Polyp, and around it you agree that Brexit is crap. And the Backstop, the Status quo, not long ago, the border comes back. All the glowing Europe are certainly not Fans. This is a corrupt caste in Brussels, one hears again and again, the wool and interfere in everything. But the price you find is just too high. Many Irish people believe Tom Conlon, felt, as so often in its history, by the British, ignored, run over, sacrifice. "This is going to be Trouble."

(editing Tamedia)

Created: 12.03.2019, 09:13 PM