Peace process talks enter fourth day

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair are today resuming attempts to save the Northern Ireland peace process with talks on the Shropshire/Staffordshire border.

Mr Blair was due to join Mr Ahern and pro-Good Friday Agreement parties for a fourth day of talks this week at Weston Park to stabilise the Northern Ireland political institutions.

But the talks will not be attended by two loyalist paramilitary-linked parties, the Progressive Unionists and Ulster Democratic Party.

PUP Assemblyman David Ervine, whose party is linked to the Ulster Volunteer Force, said they were staying away because of the way the negotiations were being run on Monday.

Mr Ervine said: ‘‘We are at the high-wire stage here where it is being suggested this whole process is about trying to instill confidence in unionism in the process.

‘‘But what we are getting is an endless list of demands from Sinn Fein.

‘‘Now we have said to the Prime Minister: be careful because that growing shopping list is ending up in pain for unionism, and when we ask Adams to define the causes of conflict, to tell us the price, we don’t get an answer except a growing list of demands.

‘‘Now, either Gerry Adams is oblivious or uncaring about the impact this is having on the unionist community. You simply cannot have a one-sided process.’’

Ulster Democratic Party leader Gary McMichael, whose party has links to the Ulster Freedom Fighters and Ulster Defence Association which withdrew support for the Agreement on Tuesday, said they were rejecting the offer to attend the talks because they felt they had no role to play.

The Northern Ireland Civic Forum member said: ‘‘As we know, a resolution revolves around the ability of the IRA to honour its commitments to put its arms beyond use.

‘‘I see no indication that they are prepared to do so, so we would be reluctant to go over to England at this stage merely to shoulder the blame of failure when quite clearly that blame does not rest with us.’’

The talks broke up on Wednesday with signs of some progress on securing nationalist support for police reforms and demilitarisation.

But Ulster Unionists and nationalist SDLP delegates left Weston Park insisting there was still no clarity from Sinn Fein on how the issue of IRA disarmament could be advanced.

Despite the stand-off over the issue of IRA arms, a spokesman for the Prime Minister said they hoped to conclude the talks today, although he stressed ‘‘we don’t talk deadlines’’.

‘‘We have already had three days of hard discussions. The Prime Minister wouldn’t be going back unless he believed there was a point, and there was a prospect of making progress.’’

But he added: ‘‘This week it is in terms of logistics, in terms of the Taoiseach’s diary as well, there is not another window between now and the middle of August.’’

During Orange Order Battle of the Boyne celebrations yesterday, the British Government faced a call from Ulster Unionist talks delegate Jeffrey Donaldson to step up pressure on the IRA to disarm by bringing forward legislation to expel Sinn Fein from the Stormont Executive.

There was also a call from the Grand Master of the Orange Order Robert Saulters for unionist parties to withdraw from the Weston Park talks.