N Ireland: Thatcher 'couldn't understand' civil rights calls

SATURDAY 27 DECEMBER 2014

Margaret Thatcher didn t understand why Irish nationalists in Northern Ireland were seeking more rights and feared that allowing them to express their identity would provoke a British Asian uprising.

Files marked "secret", just released in Dublin's National Archives, reveal that Mrs Thatcher was concerned that Northern Ireland was on the way to becoming a "Marxist society" and that she was warned against redrawing its borders to counter the perceived threat by Ireland's then Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald.

During a summit at Chequers in November 1984, Mrs Thatcher fretted about the wider consequences of addressing Catholic alienation in relation to ethnic minorities in Britain.

N Ireland Thatcher 'Couldn't Understand' Civil Rights Calls by Thavam Ratna