North Group Endorses Kerry

By Sean O’Driscoll 

THE San Francisco-based human rights organization Northern Ireland Alert has called on Irish Americans to vote for Senator John Kerry in the presidential election based on his knowledge of Irish affairs. 

The group issued three publications this week analyzing the candidates’s knowledge of Northern Ireland issues. 

The first publication is an editorial entitled “American Participation In the Northern Ireland Peace Process Is Important and Has Been Neglected.” 

It reviews President Clinton’s track record on the Northern Ireland peace process, which was supported by Kerry, and discusses how Democratic initiatives in Northern Ireland could have application to resolving other global conflicts.

The editorial finds President George W. Bush’s administration incapable of adhering to five key tactics employed by President Clinton in negotiations leading to the 1998 Good Friday Agreement peace accord.

These tactics include personal commitment, communication with a special envoy; adherence to a multilateralist approach, the use of twin-track diplomacy on arms decommissioning and peace talks; and finally, an overall willingness to take risks for peace.

The editorial also details the current unfavorable regard that Ireland and Europe hold for President Bush, concluding that the president’s reputation from human rights abuses in Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib prison have greatly weakened his stand in Northern Ireland as a committed, honest peace broker.

The editorial finds that it brings up similar limitations in Bush’s ability to deal with the Middle East and other conflicts. 

The group also published a summary on the United States presidential candidates’ activities to date on Ireland. It covers the actions of Kerry, Senator John Edwards, President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and the administration during past and recent times. 

It concludes, “Kerry has been an active follower of and participant in Irish affairs. His actions to date hold great promise that a Kerry administration would equal President Bush’s record on the Irish issue, with the good possibility that he would surpass it in the areas of (1) personal involvement and (2) restoring our relationship with Europe and Ireland to an extent where our president’s direct input into the peace process would be on surer footing.”

Those involved in drafting the report include Jim Brosnahan, a well-known Irish American lawyer and senior counsel with the Morrison and Foerster legal firm. He has visited Northern Ireland many times defending Republican prisoners facing deportation from the U.S.