Ireland’s Varadkar accuses UK of ‘disrespectful’ Northern Ireland policy

The deputy prime minister of Ireland, Leo Varadkar, accused the British government of risking the dissolution of the United Kingdom and making shocking blunders over Northern Ireland.

Varadkar said Boris Johnson's administration had been undemocratic and disrespectful and tacitly accused of being dishonest and dishonourable.

The t naiste made a sharp attack in a BBC interview on Thursday night, days after the Northern Ireland protocol bill, which could override the deal, cleared its first hurdle in the House of Commons.

If you impose things on Northern Ireland that a majority of people don't want, that means that more people will turn away from the union, and that's a strategic mistake for people who want to keep the union. He said it was a peculiar policy coming from a government that purports to defend the union.

Varadkar, who is due to succeed Miche l Martin as taoiseach later this year, said he found it shocking and hard to accept that Downing Street tried to change the protocol. What the British government is doing now is very undemocratic and disrespectful to people in Northern Ireland because it is taking power away from the assembly. An honourable government would honour a treaty it had agreed and abide by international law, he said. He said it is not normal for a democratic government in a respected country to sign a treaty and then try to pass domestic legislation to override it.

Varadkar rubbished statements from Liz Truss, the UK foreign secretary, who said the EU's proposed solutions would worsen bureaucratic obstacles. There are some people who are able to say a square is a circle. That is not the facts. Asked about a statement from Brandon Lewis, the Northern Ireland secretary, who said relations with Dublin were great Varadkar replied: In my political lifetime, I have never seen relations this bad. London didn't want to work with Dublin, picked fights with Brussels and was not even-handed in Belfast, he said.

Adrian O Neill, Ireland ambassador to the UK, rebutted an opinion piece by Truss that had defended the protocol legislation in a letter to the Financial Times. He said it would cause a legal and political vacuum in Northern Ireland.

On Friday, Michelle O Neill, Sinn F in s deputy leader and putative first minister of Northern Ireland, laid a wreath at a cenotaph in Belfast to commemorate British army soldiers many from Ireland who died at the Battle of the Somme in 1916, an important anniversary for unionists.

Sinn F in leaders have previously attended First World War commemorations but not in Belfast. O Neill attended a low-key event before the city's official commemoration. As political leaders, we have a responsibility to reach beyond our comfort zones and reach out to friendship, and to do whatever we can to heal the wounds of the past, she said.