The Politics of Trade and Diplomacy: Ireland's Evolving Relationship with the Muslim Middle East

Abstract

This article charts Ireland's relationship with the countries of the Muslim Middle East since the 1950s. It begins by examining the bilateral diplomatic, political and economic relationship that emerged following Ireland's entry into the United Nations in 1955. It examines the impact on this nascent association with the Muslim Middle East of Ireland's gradual involvement in the region under the auspices of UN peacekeeping and diplomacy. Its main focus, however, is on the intensification of diplomatic and economic connections between Ireland and this group of states after Ireland's entry into the European Economic Community in 1973. It assesses the diplomatic and trade dimensions of this increasingly important relationship with particular reference to Ireland's approach to crucial regional political issues. It argues that trade considerations were by no means the sole factor influencing Ireland's foreign policy approach to the Muslim Middle East during this period, but that such considerations, nonetheless, had a determining role to play in Ireland's foreign policy in the region.