Focus on republicans ‘unhealthy’, says McGuinness

THE focus on the responsibility of republicans to play their part in breaking the political deadlock in Northern Ireland is unhealthy, Sinn Féin’s chief negotiator said yesterday.

Martin McGuinness was reacting to Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble’s statement that visible evidence of IRA decommissioning was needed.

Mr Trimble said unionists would not be satisfied with a simple statement from the international decommissioning body chief, Canadian General John de Chastelain, that an act of decommissioning had taken place.