Northern Ireland voters asked to back powersharing

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) — Voters in Northern Ireland were challenged Thursday to back renewed power-sharing between their Protestant and Catholic leaders, an experiment in compromise designed to end decades of bloodshed over the territory's future.

The re-election of the Northern Ireland Assembly follows a surprisingly successful full four-year term for its outgoing coalition of British Protestants and Irish Catholics, who spent more than three decades locked in conflict that cost more than 3,700 lives.

Such cross-community cooperation was the central goal of Northern Ireland's Good Friday peace accord, but it faces a resurgent campaign of attacks by Irish Republican …