Judges in Belfast have ruled that Boris Johnson’s decision to suspend parliament for five weeks was lawful and would not damage the Northern Ireland peace process.
The high court decision follows a landmark ruling by Scottish judges on Wednesday that said the prime minister acted illegally in proroguing parliament in order to stifle debate in the Commons.
The Belfast case, involving three cases, turned on partially different legal issues to the cases heard in London and Edinburgh.
Lawyers for the applicants in Belfast argued that a no-deal Brexit on 31 October would undermine agreements involving the UK and Irish governments that were struck during the peace process and which underpin cross-border co-operation between the two nations.
One of the applicants was a high-profile victims’ campaigner Raymond McCord, whose son was murdered by loyalist paramilitaries in 1997.
Another victims’ campaigner, Jamie Waring, brought a case. He was represented by the Belfast-based civil rights organisation the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ).
