In Northern Ireland, praise for monarchy vies with disdain
BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) — It’s less than a ten-minute walk from the Falls Road to the Shankhill Road in Northern Ireland’s capital, where Catholics and Protestants still live in segregated enclaves.
But to hear people in these adjoining neighborhoods explain their almost diametrically opposite views of the British monarchy, it might as well be 1,000 miles.
And so as King Charles III arrived in Northern Ireland for the first visit since his mother’s death elevated him to the throne, the voices of Belfast offered a sharp reminder of the country’s persistent, complicated, and, at times, bloody political realities.
On the street residents call The Shankhill -- the center of a Protestant neighborhood with a long history of loyalty to the crown -- British flags fluttered over shops and from light poles. At the foot of a giant mural of a young Elizabeth II proclaiming her “the people’s queen,” many proud to be her subjects came bearing flowers and notes of emotional farewell.
Britain's King Charles III, right, and Camilla, the Queen Consort look at floral tributes as they arrive at Hillsborough Castle, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Sept. 13, 2022. (Michael Cooper/PA via AP)
“We swore our allegiance to the queen and she stuck by us,” said Jacqueline Humphries, 58, once a soldier in the Ulster Defence Regiment, established by the British Army to police Northern Ireland during the decades of sectarian violence known as The Troubles. “I think Charles will do just as good a job. She trained him well.”
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Not half a mile away on the Falls Road -- the nationalist stronghold that served as a base for the Irish Republican Army and its decades-long guerrilla campaign against British rule -- those heading to work Tuesday brushed off any suggestion that Charles’ visit could validate the crown’s claim to Northern Ireland.
“They can believe that, but we still believe we will get a united Ireland,” said Paul Walker, 55, walking past a 3-story-high mural of Bobby Sands, an IRA militant who died while on a hunger strike in prison in 1981.
Charles is “not our king. Bobby Sands was our king here,” said 52-year-old Bobby Jones. “Queen has never done anything for us. Never did. None of the royals do.”
Walker and others said Queen Elizabeth II had earned a measure of respect, if never affection, for her decision in 2012 to shake hands with Martin McGuinness, the former IRA commander who went on to serve as Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister. But Charles is unwelcome.