New Coalition

FitzGerald gains power

For three weeks after Ireland's inconclusive general election, incumbent Prime Minister Charles Haughey and Opposition Leader Garret FitzGerald raced to form a new government. Last week FitzGerald won. He crafted an ingenious pact between his own pro-business Fine Gael (Family of the Irish) party and the ideologically distant, pro-union Labor Party. The result: a razor-thin majority of three seats in the Irish Dail (parliament)--and a coalition so vulnerable it will take all of FitzGerald's wizardry just to last out the summer.

Perhaps the greatest threat to the new government lies in Northern Ireland. I.R.A. Militants Kieran Doherty and Paddy Agnew, both 26, won seats to the Dail in last month's election, but neither has been able to attend. They are prisoners in the H-block of Ulster's Maze Prison, where Doherty is now in the seventh week of a hunger strike. His death or Agnew's resignation would cause by-elections that could be won by Haughey and his Fianna Fail (Band of Destiny) party, thereby weakening FitzGerald's government still more. That possibility has forced both Irish leaders to reconsider their positions on Ulster. The former Prime Minister has begun criticizing the unyielding tactics of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. At the same time, FitzGerald has reversed a pledge to give priority to Ireland's ailing economy. He called a settlement in Northern Ireland his No. 1 goal. Said he: "Whatever action is necessary, no matter how unpopular, it will be taken."

FitzGerald plans to continue the Irish-British consultations on Northern Ireland started by Haughey, by meeting with Thatcher later this year. Stressing that "uniting peoples is more important than uniting territories," he also hopes to open talks with Ulster Protestants, who so far have brusquely rejected his offer.

Meanwhile, London, fearful of an outbreak of Protestant terrorism, still refuses to grant I.R.A. hunger strikers political-prisoner status. Late last week, the strikers appeared to give ground somewhat, offering to drop their insistence on special status for themselves if their demands for improved prison conditions were applied to all inmates at the Maze.

More broadly, London insists that Ulster will remain British as long as a majority of its population--two-thirds Protestant--so desires. Humphrey Atkins, British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, last week created an advisory council composed of 50 Protestants and Roman Catholics to help him govern Ulster. That plan was criticized by Protestants fearful of a "sellout," but former British Labor Prime Minister James Callahan went further. He called for a separate parliament and citizenship for Ulster.

Whatever the merits of Britain's case, the Thatcher government's apparent callousness over the hunger strikers in the H-block has been costly, especially in the U.S. Since the death of Hunger Striker Bobby Sands in May, direct and indirect contributions to the I.R.A. from Irish-Americans have reportedly tripled. During a visit to New York last month, Prince Charles was the target of loud anti-British demonstrations. Last week Queen Elizabeth's sister, Princess Margaret--who caused a furor in a 1979 visit to the U.S. when she was reported to have called the Irish "pigs"--was persuaded by Thatcher to cancel a proposed trip to Washington scheduled for next week. The reason: fears of further protests and even personal assaults by pro-I.R.A. Americans.

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