It is now 12 years since Queen Elizabeth II’s historic state visit to Ireland in 2011; the first visit by a ruling monarch since the Irish state’s formation in 1921. The visit was, and still is, widely regarded as a watershed moment in the growing detente between the UK and Ireland prior to Brexit. The queen herself reportedly even described it as “her very best ever state visit”. Just twelve months later, the now-late queen then shook hands with Martin McGuinness, a former commander of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) who had become deputy first minister of Northern Ireland. The…

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