Trimble: IRA must disarm if I am to return

David Trimble said the IRA must put its weapons beyond use permanently if he is to return as Northern Ireland First Minister.

Mr Trimble stepped down from the job at midnight last night over the failure of the IRA to disarm.

In his first public appearance since his resignation, he said the IRA had three years to honour its obligation under the Good Friday Agreement to disarm.

He noted the IRA had missed two deadlines for the full implementation of the Agreement - May 22 last year and June 2001.

"It is for that reason because I can no longer have any confidence in the promises, the unfulfilled promises made by republicans, and because I wanted to ensure that there could be no question of the process moving beyond this without the (arms) issue being properly settled that I have now ceased to be First Minister in Northern Ireland," he declared.

"I am prepared to resume that office but only if we get this issue settled and we see weapons being put permanently beyond use in accordance with the decommissioning legislation.

"That will have to be done and we will have to be sure that the Agreement is going to be properly adhered to and not traduced."

Mr Trimble was speaking in Thiepval in France where he was attending a Battle of the Somme Commemoration.