Joe Biden in Ireland Highlights | US president tours Carlingford Castle

United States President Joe Biden on Wednesday (April 12) urged Northern Irish politicians to restore their powersharing government with the promise that scores of major American corporations were ready to invest in the region.

United States President Joe Biden toured Carlingford Castle on Wednesday during his visit to the Republic of Ireland, in County Louth. County Louth on Ireland's east coast is the home of the president's Finnegan ancestors. 

United States President Joe Biden arrived in his ancestral hometown of Ballina and was greeted by the residents.

On his arrival in Ireland's capital Dublin, Biden was greeted by children of US embassy staff. Biden greeted the crowd of children at Dublin airport enthusiastically, admiring a toy Air Force One and answering their questions. In Ireland, Biden is accompanied by his second son Hunter and his younger sister Valerie.

On his arrival in Ireland's capital Dublin, Biden met families of the US embassy staff. Biden greeted the crowd of children at Dublin airport enthusiastically, admiring a toy Air Force One and answering their questions. In Ireland, Biden is accompanied by his second son Hunter and his younger sister Valerie.

US President Joe Biden said that there were 'unlimited possibilities' fir investment and growth in Northern Ireland, 25 years on from the Belfast / Good Friday Agreement. Biden was speaking in Ulster University in Belfast.

But, he said, peace and stability must always be guarded, warning that the January 6, 2021, riot at Congress in Washington had proved that in every generation, "democracy needs champions".
 

Joe Biden arrives in Dublin after departing from Belfast aboard Air Force One. He is travelling with his sister Valerie Biden Owen and son Hunter. 

He will  take a trip to Co Louth from here, stopping in Carlingford later this afternoon to see King John's Castle.  

Due to the terrible weather, he will now travel by motorcade to Co Louth instead of by helicopter.

The US president is currently travelling to Co Louth after visiting Belfast and changing his mode of transport owing to bad weather. 

He is also anticipated to include a visit to Carlingford's King John's Castle in the late afternoon and a walkabout in Dundalk, as reported by Sky news. 

Jeffrey Donaldson, the leader of the DUP, has said nothing about what Joe Biden said in his speech changes his views about power sharing.

The response comes after President Biden pushed to restore their power sharing government.

Joe Biden will no longer travel by helicopter to Co Louth due to bad weather situation, Irish government officials said. The US president will instead travel to his first set of engagements in the Republic of Ireland via motorcade, reported Skynews. 

Jeffrey Donaldson, the leader of the DUP, has said that US President Joe Biden's visit "does not change the political dynamic" in Northern Ireland.

Biden in his speech urged leaders to restore their power sharing government and also promised US investment.

"It is not his job – as we heard in his speech – to take decisions for political leaders in Northern Ireland but that the United States stands ready to support Northern Ireland in every way it can".

Joe Biden has urged Northern Ireland's feuding political leaders to restore its power-sharing government established through the Good Friday Agreement.

"I hope the (Northern Ireland) Executive and Assembly will soon be restored," Biden said in a speech at Ulster University in Belfast. He also hailed the "unlimited possibilities" offered in the UK-ruled territory.

Biden said to the people of Belfast that what happens in Ireland affects several people in the US as well.

"I want you to know that there is a large population that is invested in what happens here, that cares a great deal about what happens here," Biden said.

"This is something that brings Washington together - it brings America together."

Talking about the Good Friday Agreement, Biden said peace secured by the deal after decades of violence was "not inevitable" and hailed everyone who had worked to secure the agreement 25 years ago.

"Thousands of families had been affected by the Troubles - the losses are real. The pain was personal. Every person killed in the Troubles left an empty dining room table," Biden said.

"Peace was not inevitable, we can never forget that. But they kept going because they never stopped believing that success is inevitable."

Before Biden's speech, the US ambassador to the UK addressed the crowds in Belfast, saying she wants to recapture the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement.

"Let's not forget that 25 years of the Good Friday Agreement remains a stunning, stunning achievement," Jane Hartley said. 

"Today, we remember the people who risked their lives to achieve it. The people who, as President Biden said, walked brave steps so their children might have a better future.

Talking about the Windsor Framework, a proposed post-Brexit legal agreement between the European Union and the UK, she said, "The Windsor Framework gives everyone a roadmap to move past political stalemate towards a brighter future."

US President Joe Biden is speaking at the Ulster University ahead of the main event. He started by recalling his last visit in 1991 and said that was when you could not have a "glass building in this neighbourhood. "It wouldn't have stood up," he said.

"But things are changing," he says.

US President Joe Biden met with UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in Belfast, Northern Ireland on Wednesday as part of a visit to mark the 25th anniversary of Northern Ireland's 1998 peace deal. The two leaders posed for the cameras after Downing Street rejected claims that bilateral talks had been reduced to just coffee. The coffee meeting has been dubbed a "bi-latte" by The New York Times.

Security in Belfast has been tightened as Biden visits the city during his Northern Ireland trip to mark the 25th anniversary of the 1998 peace deal.

A spokesperson of the US National Security Council has said that US President Joe Biden's "track record shows he is not anti-British". Amanda Sloat's comment amid criticism over Biden's truncated visit to Northern Ireland and reports that he will be holding a brief meeting with Rishi Sunak in Belfast.

Sloat said, "The UK remains one of our strongest and closest allies". She added that comments from former first minister Arlene Foster that President Biden "hates the UK" were "simply untrue."

Biden was greeted late last night by UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak after which he reached Northern Ireland. The British-ruled province has been once again gripped by political and sectarian squalls, 25 years on from a US-brokered peace agreement.

Biden, in Washington, had said he wanted to lend support to the recent Windsor Framework deal between the European Union and Britain to ease post-Brexit trade barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. The deal has till now failed to convince the region's largest pro-British party, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), to end a boycott of the local assembly. Powersharing has endured multiple breakdowns and suspensions since 1998, including the assembly not sitting between 2017 and 2020 over a different row.