UUP to decide on response to peace process proposals

The Ulster Unionist Party is meeting to decide its definitive response to the Government's proposals to break the deadlock in the peace process.

Party leader David Trimble is discussing the package with MPs, Assembly members and representatives of the House of Lords at UUP headquarters in Belfast.

Unionists have been put under greater pressure to accept the proposals with confirmation that the IRA has started a process to put their weapons beyond use.

Mr Trimble, whose room for manoeuvre is limited by hard-line critics of the Agreement within his party, said the report brought the IRA into line with the loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force which agreed methods of disarmament a year ago.

"However, it leaves open a number of issues, the most important that there is actually a process and that the process begins.

"The IRA has taken a significant step towards decommissioning, but it hasn't actually begun decommissioning."

Mr Trimble later added that the absence of actual decommissioning in a manner which would maximise public confidence meant that there was nothing for his party to respond to.

In the latest development, the International Commission on Decommissioning, announced that the Provisionals had proposed a plan to deal with guns which involved no risk to the public and prevented dissident republicans seizing them.

It followed fresh talks between the two sides amid fears that the Government could be forced to suspend the Stormont Assembly over Ulster Unionist anger at the lack of progress on actual disarmament.

General de Chastelain said he was satisfied that the IRA proposal met his Commission's remit in accordance with the British and Irish Governments' scheme and regulations.