IRA peace process stance 'cuts no ice' - Trimble

The IRA’s refusal to accept the blame for the crisis in the Northern Ireland peace process cuts no ice with other parties, Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble claimed tonight.

In a response to the terror group’s accusation in a newspaper interview that unionism had failed to live up to its commitments and obligations, the Northern Ireland First Minister said the Provisionals’ comments marked a “new and worrying phase in republican thinking”.

Mr Trimble argued: “Anyone, unionist or nationalist, reading the full text of the interview could not be other than taken aback at the disingenuousness and maliciousness of the IRA spokesman.

“It comes as no surprise that the IRA accepts no responsibility for any of the problems in the political process.

“Their professed saintliness cuts no ice in any quarter. What is worrying is that the IRA seems to have reached a new level of unreality in its thinking and pronouncements.”

In the interview with the republican newspaper An Phoblacht, an IRA spokesman denied unionist claims that it orchestrated street violence which bedevilled Belfast over the summer.

The IRA also denied unionist claims that it was behind the break-in in March at the top security Castlereagh police station or that it had sanctioned three republicans to visit Colombia before their arrest in August 2001 on suspicion of training left wing FARC rebels.

Noting the organisation’s allegation that unionists had not lived up to their commitments, Mr Trimble said there was no “example to back up this baseless claim”.

“Ulster Unionism has implemented every single one of its commitments under the Belfast Agreement including the North-South arrangements,” he insisted.

“The Ulster Unionist leadership is dedicated to the fair and equitable settlement arrived at in April 1998.

“This commitment and delivery on obligations is in marked contrast to the failure on the part of the Republican Movement.

“In particular, the Republican Movement has not met its ‘commitment to exclusively democratic and peaceful means of resolving differences on political issues and ... opposition to any use or threat of force by others for any political purpose, whether in regard to this agreement or otherwise’ in the Belfast Agreement.”

Mr Trimble accused the IRA of lying about its involvement in recent sectarian street violence.

The group’s insistence that there had been no breaches of its ceasefire was also a “wicked untruth,” the Upper Bann MP insisted, contradicted by people shot dead by the organisation or maimed.

While allegations about the IRA's involvement with Colombian left-wing rebels and in the Castlereagh break-in were as yet “technically unproven”, the UUP leader said the weight of evidence was against its claims.

He argued: “The political process is in crisis not through any unionist contrivance but because the IRA has not accepted the need for change.

“It has to be pushed and dragged every step of the way so far.

“Most glaringly of all, it has not fulfilled its promise of May 7 2000 to ‘verifiably decommission in a way that would maximise public confidence’. We have had reported two welcome acts of decommissioning but public confidence cannot be said to have been satisfied.

“If the Belfast Agreement was about anything it was about peace. Peace is simply not compatible with the existence of paramilitary organisations.

“What is required from the IRA and all the other terrorists is nothing less than for them to completely and forever forswear violence, the means of violence and the organisations of violence. This they have not done.”

Mr Trimble’s hard hitting response to the IRA interview came just hours after he was accused by Sinn Fein’s Gerry Kelly of pursuing a policy to force republicans out of the power-sharing government.