EDITORIAL: Maintain agreement in Ireland

Apr. 20—Over the past several weeks, several cities in Northern Ireland have experienced their worst street violence since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement created a fragile truce between loyalists to the United Kingdom and Irish nationalists who want to unify the entire island under the Republic of Ireland.

Riots in Belfast, Derry, Carrickfergus, Newtownabbey and Ballymena have injured at least 90 police officers and have produced the arrests of scores of people.

Police have said that the riots have been carried out by youthful loyalist gangs but there are competing theories on the underlying cause.

Attacks began soon after implementation of a complicated and controversial Brexit-related agreement between the U.K. and the European Union. It creates a border in the Irish Sea, and import/export regulations that have increased consumer prices and unemployment in Northern Ireland.

But the attacks also coincided with a crackdown by the Northern Ireland provincial government against organized crime operations with which the street gangs are believed to be affiliated.

The governments of Ireland, the U.K. and Northern Ireland have condemned the violence and have called for peace.

In 1998, the United States played an indispensable role in producing the Good Friday Agreement. President Bill Clinton appointed George Mitchell as a special envoy and he became the trusted broker for all parties.

Now, President Joe Biden should be prepared to preserve Mitchell's work by naming a new special envoy to help reinvigorate the agreement and ensure that it does not collapse under the weight of criminal or economic pressure.