Sinn Féin accuses London of violating international law by modifying the protocol for Northern Ireland

MADRID, 12 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The president of the Irish nationalist party Sinn Féin, Mary Lou McDonald, has accused the British government this Sunday of being about to violate international law when it presents its plan on Monday to modify the Northern Ireland Protocol included in the Brexit agreement, despite warnings from the European Union.

Boris Johnson's government has been pushing for months to rewrite a deal that keeps Northern Ireland in the EU's single market and creates a customs border with the rest of the UK.

The Protocol is one of the key pillars of the divorce agreement between the United Kingdom and the European Union. Created in its day to avoid a 'hard border' in Ulster, it now requires the introduction of controls on the traffic of goods with the island of Great Britain, since otherwise the entire United Kingdom would continue to be part of the single market.

The British government expects the bill to pass the UK Lower House of Commons before Parliament is reconvened at the end of July.

The British minister for Northern Ireland, Brandon Lewis, has insisted this Sunday on Sky News that the bill was only intended to safeguard the 1998 Belfast Agreement, considered a cornerstone of peace in Northern Ireland.

"What we are looking to do is fix the problems that we have seen with the protocol. It is about how the protocol has been implemented, and the lack of flexibility that we have seen in the EU over the last year and a half," he said.

In response, McDonald has accused the British government of having been unable to correspond "to the commitment exhibited by the European Union" when negotiating the annex.

"The British Government has not been constructive, has sought the path of destruction and now proposes to introduce legislation that will undoubtedly violate international law," he lamented in statements collected by the 'Irish Times'.