Mitchell happy to hear of N. Ireland agreement

Former U.S. Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell of Maine said Monday he was pleased to hear of the agreement between the Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland.

The announcement, he said, lays the foundation for a brighter future for the people of Northern Ireland.

Mitchell served as moderator for 22 months of talks in Northern Ireland that led to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 which called for a new assembly in which the longtime adversaries would share power.

“It really is a very positive development,” Mitchell said Monday in an interview from Canada, where he was vacationing.

Mitchell said he was aware of the developments in the region and has been in regular contact with representatives of the governments of Britain and Ireland. Although he has been back to Northern Ireland on numerous occasions since the 1998 agreement, Mitchell said he did not take part in the negotiations that led to Monday’s announcement.

He also said he was happy to see something Monday that never happened while he was leading the peace talks: Protestant Ian Paisley and Roman Catholic Gerry Adams sitting at the same table.

Mitchell said the two former enemies never sat down for one-on-one talks with each other during three sets of discussions he led in Northern Ireland.

“This has been a long time coming and it’s very positive,” Mitchell said.

During a news conference, Paisley and Adams agreed they must leave behind Northern Ireland’s bitter divisions and forge a unity government, the central goal of the Good Friday peace accord of 1998 – a pact Paisley long denounced as a surrender to Sinn Fein.

Mitchell said six weeks was more than enough time to establish the new assembly.

“It might be too long; something might happen,” he said. “They had hoped it would be up and running right now. The deadline was today. But now they have a commitment to go forward.”

He added that the agreement “reduces dramatically the likelihood of a return to conflict, it increases the chances of political stability in Northern Ireland and it will enable what I think will be increased economic growth, job creation and prosperity.”

That will not all happen overnight, Mitchell said.

“This is a divided, segregated society,” he said. “It will take time – a long time – to get over the hurts of the past. But this makes all those positive things possible.”

Mitchell serves as chancellor of the Queen’s University of Belfast and said he will visit Northern Ireland for commencement in July. He said he expects to meet with political leaders at that time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.