Without celebrations and in an atmosphere of renewed political tension and security concerns, Northern Ireland celebrates in April the twenty-fifth anniversary of the peace agreement that ended three decades of bloody conflict.

On April 10, 1998, on the Good Friday before Christian Easter, the Republicans who supported the reunification of their province with Ireland and the Unionists determined to remain in the United Kingdom, extracted an unexpected peace agreement after intense negotiations involving London, Dublin and Washington.

The Good Friday Agreement ended three decades of violence that left 3,500 dead between Unionists, mostly Protestants, and mostly Catholic Republicans, with the involvement of the British Army.

But 25 years later, everyone tends to commemorate, not celebrate. The domestic institutions created in the aftermath of the peace agreement, including a joint executive authority between the two political camps, have been paralyzed for more than a year due to disagreements arising from Britain's exit from the European Union.

Following the attempted assassination of a police officer in February by members of a dissident republican group, the terrorist threat level in Northern Ireland was recently raised from "substantial" to "severe".

The attempted murder, which was condemned by political leaders, reminded Northern Ireland of the violence that was common in the province.

Over the coming weeks, Belfast will host a series of events for current and former heads of state to mark the anniversary of the end of the conflict.

US President Joe Biden, of Irish descent, will head to the province on a trip that has not yet been scheduled. He is expected to visit the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

On April 17, Queen's University Belfast will organize a three-day conference with the participation of former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, whose husband, Bill Clinton, president between 1993 and 2001, played a key role in achieving the peace agreement.

This meeting will focus on the transformation that the British province has witnessed in the past 25 years.

In the years following the peace agreement, armed groups were disarmed, military borders dismantled, and British forces left the region.

"It was always about a process, and the last 25 years have been more fun and comfortable than the 25, maybe 75 years that preceded it," former prime minister Bertie Ahern told AFP.

But in 2023, peace in Northern Ireland appears more fragile than it was in 1998, except in rare stages.

And the "Democratic Unionist Party", which adheres to the province's connection to the United Kingdom, has obstructed the work of the executive branch for more than a year by refusing to participate in the government unless the post-Brexit provisions aimed at avoiding the return of the physical border with Ireland are abandoned.

Since the United Kingdom left the European Union, tensions have escalated over the Northern Ireland Protocol, which opponents fear will isolate the province from Britain and make Irish unification more likely.

In March, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who also helped broker the peace deal, said Brexit was a "hard equation" with regard to Northern Ireland.

The DUP has in recent weeks refused to renegotiate the protocol aimed at addressing unionist concerns between the EU and the UK.

An opinion poll in January revealed that a majority of Unionists would vote against the Good Friday Agreement if it was reinstated today in a referendum.