The UK’s decision to break the Northern Ireland Protocol is “surprising many people around the world,” the Irish Minister for European Affairs told Sky News.
Thomas Byrne said the measure, which he said “violated international law”, would cause “damage to reputation” and suggested it could encourage other nations to breach their treaty obligations.
Labor accused the government of pushing the “nuclear button” on the protocol. Irish Prime Minister Michael Martin said it was a “fundamental breach of confidence”.
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It comes as Brussels is threatening legal action after the UK government passed legislation that would overturn the protocol: the post-Brexit agreement governing Northern Ireland’s trade agreements.
The protocol is designed to prevent the return of a hard border with the Republic of Ireland, but it does create a border in the Irish Sea and means that British exports are subject to customs controls.
The UK says this creates problems for businesses and is a threat to the power-sharing agreements established after the Good Friday peace agreement in 1998, with the DUP refusing to support a new government. of Northern Ireland until the problems are resolved.
Foreign Minister Liz Truss told Sky News that the “unintended consequences” of the protocol – an agreement signed by Britain – made it necessary to act, with the situation “gradually getting worse”.
“That’s why the government is determined to act and we’re doing it in a reasonable way,” he said.
Ms Truss told Times Radio: “Our solution does not make the EU situation worse.
“Therefore, there is no reason why the EU should react negatively to what we are doing.”
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13:49 Ireland: “Breach of trust”
But Byrne said: “There is no doubt that it is surprising to many people around the world that Britain has signed a treaty and then decided not to abide by it.
“This is especially the case when there has been a stream of negotiations, documents prepared by the European Commission to try to resolve some of the problems of the protocol.
“But the idea that you are just moving away from your treaty obligations I think is unprecedented and it’s not just that Britain has done that.
“I have no doubt that other countries that may not be as committed to democracy and the rule of law as the United Kingdom and are looking at what the United Kingdom has done may reconsider their treaty obligations.
“Why shouldn’t they do it if Britain does that, if Britain breaks the law?”
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1:13 Protocol “undermines” the Belfast Agreement
Culture Secretary in the shadow of the work, Lucy Powell, warned of the damage that could be done to the UK’s relationship with Europe.
She told Sky News: “We do not want to start any kind of trade war, because we have pressed the nuclear button to say that an agreement we signed just a few months ago, we now want to renounce.
“This does not show us very well internationally, just at a time when we have a crisis in the cost of living in the country, problems with supply chains, problems with food imports, energy imports.
“We don’t want to make that worse right now.”
The bill will allow ministers to establish a “green lane” for trusted traders to move goods from Britain to Northern Ireland without controls, as long as the products remain within the UK.
Goods supplied by companies outside the scheme of trusted traders, or products destined for Ireland and the EU, would go through a red lane and face controls.
In a legal policy document published along with the bill, the government states that the measure is justified by international law because of the “genuinely exceptional situation”.
European Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic said the EU sees the UK’s actions as “a major concern” and will consider what steps need to be taken.
He said this would begin with the resumption of court proceedings against the UK, which he suspended in September for breaching the 2020 withdrawal treaty.
In addition to restarting infringement proceedings against the UK, he said the EU would also look into further legal action to protect the integrity of the EU’s single market, as it ruled out renegotiating the trade protocol.
What is the “doctrine of necessity”?
The new Westminster bill allows it to make changes to the legally binding Northern Ireland Protocol negotiated with the EU after Brexit, without any permission from Brussels.
Many argue that this violates international law.
But the government is using a loophole known as the “doctrine of necessity” to prevent it.
According to the UN International Law Commission, the doctrine allows a state to violate international law in its favor if it faces “serious and imminent danger.”
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs argues that the logistical and “socio-political” problems arising from the effective border between Britain and Northern Ireland in the Irish Sea justify the use of the doctrine.
“The term ‘need’ is used in international law to legally justify situations in which the only way a state can safeguard an essential interest is to breach another international obligation,” it said in a statement.
“The pressure that the protocol agreements are putting on the institutions of Northern Ireland and, in general, on socio-political conditions, has reached the point where the government has no other way to safeguard the essential interests at stake than through of the adoption of the proposed legislative solution.
“There is, therefore, clear evidence of a state of need to which the government must respond.”
But former government legal adviser Jonathan Jones, who resigned from his Brexit administration, says the EU is likely to find the use of the doctrine “completely unpersuasive”.