Ex-minister accuses Blair of 'appeasing' IRA

A former British Government minister today accused the Blair administration of ‘‘appeasing’’ republicans in the IRA.

Ex-sports minister Kate Hoey said that the Government was operating a ‘‘dangerous double standard’’ which allowed it to accept in Ulster behaviour which it would not tolerate elsewhere in Britain.

Tony Blair had failed to stick to promises made to the Unionist community that the release of paramilitary prisoners and the admission of Sinn Fein to Northern Ireland’s executive was dependent on the decommissioning of arms, she said.

The Government’s ‘‘double standards’’ on Northern Ireland led to it tolerating arms being held by terrorists when it would not allow sportsmen to own them after Dunblane, said Ms Hoey.

She compared the IRA to London’s Jamaican gangsters, saying: ‘‘We claim to be tough on crime, but demoralise the RUC at the behest of the paramilitaries. Would we dream of making the Metropolitan Police accommodate the Yardies?’’

And she said that Britain had opposed ‘‘ethnic cleansing’’ and ‘‘racial hatred’’ in the Balkans, but allowed republicans to practise them in Ulster.

Ms Hoey said: ‘‘The Government has been playing a complex game of appeasement with republicans.

‘‘(Peter) Mandelson was the last Cabinet minister to place the blame for the crisis in the process precisely where it belongs - with the IRA.

‘‘After the events of the past few days, including the news from Colombia, it will be only such plain speaking that can save the agreement.’’