An Irish border

Belfast is a youthful, vibrant, wonderful city, but one holding a dirty secret. When I first visited N. Ireland, some roads from the international airport were still blocked with coiled barbed wire and towering machine gun turrets. I came each month and watched the sectarianism being slowly dismantled, the small roads opened up again, and an air of peace spread across the ground. People from both North and South worked together at Almac in Craigavon for common purpose, and there was an air of pride and achievement in their joint labour.

Marking the border in Belfast

This summer, I visited Belfast itself for the first time, and found a city still divided. The peace lines are great walls of brick and iron, reaching up to 7 meters, topped with razor wire, and emblazoned with graffiti. They have proliferated since 1969, and there are now over 21 miles of them. The police stations along this border remain fortified, and each evening great gates close many of the roads, effectively imposing a night time curfew.



These walls seemed to put the immigrant control lines of Hungary and Macedonia into context, and make the current disagreements over a customs border with Ireland laughable. In a major European city within the UK, this is shaming.