Northern Ireland’s DUP to Take Legal Action Against Brexit Deal

Leader of the DUP Arlene Foster MLA speaks at the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) annual conference in Belfast, Northern Ireland on Oct. 26, 2019. Lorraine O'Sullivan/Reuters

DUBLIN—Members of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party are set to take part in legal action challenging part of Britain’s divorce deal with the European Union, the party said on Sunday.

The DUP oppose the Northern Ireland Protocol, which covers post-Brexit trade between Britain and Northern Ireland, because it creates barriers between the British region and the rest of the United Kingdom.

A woman walks past freshly painted loyalist graffiti in the Shankill area in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on on Jan. 31, 2021. Charles McQuillan/Getty Images

The protocol was designed to protect the European Union’s single market without creating a land border on the island of Ireland.

Leader Arlene Foster, Deputy Leader Nigel Dodds, and members of Parliament Jeffrey Donaldson and Sammy Wilson will join in the action challenging the protocol, a DUP statement said.

They will be “joining other like-minded unionists from across the United Kingdom as named parties in judicial review proceedings challenging the Northern Ireland Protocol’s compatibility with Act of Union 1800, the Northern Ireland Act of 1998 and the Belfast Agreement,” the statement said.