LONDON, July 31 (Xinhua) -- A farmer whose land straddles the border between Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland warned Wednesday that the island was at a very dangerous juncture.
Brian Renaghan, 50, was speaking as new prime minister Boris Johnson arrived in Northern Ireland for crucial talks on the latest leg of his round-Britain tour.
Johnson started a day of intense activity with talks in Belfast with the leaders of the main political parties. The meetings took place at Stormont, home of the currently suspended Northern Ireland assembly and executive.
Renaghan warned that the good work done in Ireland over the last 20 years, bringing decades of troubles and killings to an end, could be jeopardized by the no-deal grandstanding approach taken by Johnson and the British government.
He was referring to the Good Friday Peace Agreement that brought to an end a conflict in Northern Ireland, with an open border a key component of the deal.
The farmer told Xinhua: "The peace process hangs by a thread and the future of small family farms hangs in the balance... A no-deal Brexit will open the door to unregulated cheap food imports making farming in Ireland unprofitable and driving families off the land.
"The future of business looks bleak and will also raise unemployment levels and affect the futures of our young people," Renaghan said.
Renaghan believed that his farm may not be viable after Brexit. A shallow stream through his farm is the dividing line between British-controlled Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic which will remain an EU member.
Like many farms along the 500-km border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, Renaghan's 200-acre farm is divided in two, one half in County Armagh in Northern Ireland, the other in County Monaghan in the Republic of Ireland.
No sign of a border is visible, except the speed limit shown by miles in Northern Ireland and by kilometers in Ireland.
Renaghan's farm has been handed down for four generations. He claims 16,000 pounds (21,113 U.S. dollars) of EU subsidies each year to keep his business afloat. The EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) system currently allocates some 3 billion pounds a year to British farmers based on the amount of land they own.
The border straddling his farmland will be part of the only EU frontier in the British Isles.
Johnson met each of Northern Ireland's main political parties, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Sinn Fein, UUP, Alliance and SDLP.
His message to them was that devolution must to be restored as soon as possible to Northern Ireland following the collapse of power-sharing in 2017.
Johnson said: "The people of Northern Ireland have now been without an Executive and Assembly for two years and six months. Put simply this is much, much too long.
"Northern Ireland's citizens need and deserve the executive to get up and running again as soon as possible, so that locally-accountable politicians can take decisions on the issues that really matter to local people."
He said he stressed to party leaders he going to do everything in his power to make the ongoing talks to restore devolution a success.
"I will be helping the parties in any way I can to help get that over the line," he said.
Johnson's Conservative government at Westminster relies on the support of the 10 DUP MPs in the House of Commons to give him a narrow majority.
