Russia – Ireland: the Hard Path to Mutual Understanding

Abstract

In 2023, it will be 50 years since the establishment of diplomatic relations between Russia (then the USSR) and the Republic of Ireland. The article deals with the complicated relationships between Russia (the USSR) and the Republic of Ireland on the path to establish the diplomatic relations. Ireland and the Soviet Russia tried to make the first contacts in 1919, but they failed to establish the trade and diplomatic relations at that time. At the end of the 1920th – beginning of the 1930th the countries undertook new attempts of rapprochement, but the negotiations were interrupted because of unfavourable international situation. Hostile perceptions and anti-Soviet position of Irish governments backed by the Catholic Church prevented the normalization of the Soviet-Irish relations. The special attention is devoted to the activity of the Ireland – USSR Society established in 1945 with the aim to develop friendship and mutual understanding between the people and to establish the trade and diplomatic relations between these two countries. The same activity in the Soviet Union was carried out by the the All-Union Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries, which became the Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries in 1957. At the beginning of the 1970s in the connection with the forthcoming Helsinki conference on security in Europe the negotiations started about the establishment the diplomatic missions in Moscow and Dublin. They were successfully culminated in September 1973.