Sinn Fein Gives DUP Equal Marriage Ultimatum in Northern Ireland
The Sinn Fein Party in Northern Ireland has given the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) an ultimatum regarding equal marriage: they will not agree to any power-sharing agreement that doesn’t include same-sex marriage for the country, reports the Belfast Telegraph.
“In 2019, for anybody to seriously say any legislator can sit and actively deny or discriminate against one section of society is just not acceptable,” Michelle O’Neill, the party’s vice president, said at Belfast Pride on Monday (July 29).
“It’s our determination to deliver marriage equality, we must deliver marriage equality.
“It doesn’t sit comfortably with me as an Irish republican to ask the British government to legislate but if rights are going to continually be denied and the assembly can’t deliver, then that is the context in which Westminster can deliver the legislation.
“Any deal that’s reached in terms of the restoration of the assembly will have to include marriage equality, that’s the bottom line.”
If power-sharing talks fail, then same-sex marriage is set to be introduced in Northern Ireland regardless by January 2020. British MPs recently voted 383-73 in favour of an amendment that would force the issue in the country.
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