Editorial: Now the focus turns to the relationship between London and unionism

President Biden’s visit to Ireland is now over. Now, locally, the attention will turn to the arrival of the former US president Bill Clinton and other dignitaries who will be celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement. The main events will be held at Queen’s University but the fact that Mr Biden has already been to Northern Ireland adds to a sense that the big commemorations are already over.

One thing has become clear: it will not be possible to co-ordinate any return to Stormont with the anniversary. In fact the pressure to do so is off and President Biden in his words at the University of Ulster accepted as much. There even seems to be some recognition in parts of the American establishment, perhaps even parts of the Irish establishment, that the creation of an internal trade border between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK leaves unionists with a legitimate grievance. Of course those establishments would say that unionists, in supporting Brexit, are partly to blame. But while this newspaper supported the 1998 accord and still thinks that it included significant achievements, as outlined by Professor Henry Patterson on pages 14 and 15, there is an understandable feeling within unionism that Sinn Fein has been allowed to turn the Belfast Agreement into a process, as opposed to a settlement.

London, for all its over selling of the Windsor Framework, seems to understand this. That is now the key relationship, between the UK government and unionism. The former is going to have to do a lot more than talk up its deal. The Union is still in peril and Downing Street needs to show that it is going to help unionists against determined separatists.