Unionist cowardice blamed for failure of peace talks

The current negotiations in the Northern Ireland peace process have failed because of unionist cowardice, it was claimed today.

Veteran republican Brian Keenan also told an IRA commemoration in Coalisland, Co Tyrone that Sinn Fein was right not to join the cross-community Policing Board.

“Of course society needs a policing service but that service has to be accountable to the people,” he said.

“At the moment for me it is a non-event because the threshold of acceptability and accountability is not there.”

Keenan, who was convicted for his role in the IRA bombing campaign in Britain in the 1970s, added: “These negotiations have failed at the moment because unionism hadn’t the guts to come through and work together.”

The peace process has stalled after the British and Irish governments delayed releasing their blueprint on the future of the Good Friday Agreement amid fears that a proposed IRA statement would not go far enough to satisfy unionists.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams last night vowed to remain engaged in the process and maintain contacts with both governments in an effort to move things forward.

However, there is increasing gloom among the parties and London and Dublin over the ability to restore devolution before the May 29 Assembly elections.

Last week Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and British Prime Minister Tony Blair put on hold plans to launch their blueprint on the full implementation of the Agreement until the IRA made a definitive statement about its future.

Both leaders had hoped that the IRA would confirm it was ending all paramilitary activity, paving the way for the restoration of the Northern Ireland Assembly and power-sharing executive.

The IRA passed a statement to both governments last Sunday, which Mr Adams claimed stretched Republicanism considerably and was “clear and unambiguous“.

However, Dublin and London has refused to launch their blueprint because of concerns that the IRA’s position does not go far enough to persuade David Trimble’s Ulster Unionists to go back into government with Sinn Fein.

Mr Trimble claimed yesterday the process was being held up by “a couple of hundred hoods“.

The Upper Bann MP said: “What we have got is a couple of hundred people who don’t want to give up the old ways and who still benefit from the old ways, particularly in terms of racketeering.”