Elections in doubt, says Trimble
Speaking after an hour-long meeting with Mr Blair at 10 Downing Street, Mr Trimble said it was “increasingly problematic” whether the elections scheduled for May can go ahead.
It was questionable whether there was any point holding an election to an institution which was suspended, he said.
Mr Trimble asked the Sinn Féin leadership for talks on what steps the republican movement might make to end the current crisis in the peace process.
He said the UUP wanted to see not only acts of decommissioning by the IRA, but also assurances that the organisation will disband and paramilitaries will end “all violent and illegal activities”.
The Downing Street talks came as Ian Paisley’s hard-line Democratic Unionists held out the prospect of the party cutting a deal with Sinn Féin.
William Hay, a DUP Assembly member, said if republicans gave certain guarantees, the DUP would be prepared to “sit down and do business with them like any other constitutional party”.
Speaking after what he said was “a fairly frank and useful discussion” with Mr Blair, Mr Trimble said time was running out for a decision on whether the institutions could be restored.
He said: “The Government will have to take a decision on this and will have to take a decision fairly soon.
“There is a question of whether there is any point in having an election to an institution that no longer exists and what the practical consequences of that would be.
“Our preference would be for matters to be resolved in such a way that the institutions could be re-formed and then proceed to go to an election, but whether that is possible in the time available is now a very open question.
“I don’t want to foreclose these matters, but the Government are going to have to make decision on this and it is not going to be an easy one.”
Mr Blair has called for “acts of completion” from paramilitaries as a way of getting the peace process back on track.
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