Sinn Féin optimistic about peace process

Progress can be made in Northern Ireland’s peace process after next month’s Assembly election, Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness claimed today.

As political parties in the North began to focus on the November 26 poll, the Mid Ulster MP argued that “considerable progress” had been made in his party’s recent discussions with the Ulster Unionists.

Mr McGuinness declared: “I am absolutely convinced that progress can be made in the aftermath of the election.

“Obviously, I want to make that progress with the pro-Agreement Unionist party.

“I think again that people do need to be reminded that the Ulster Unionist leader was sitting in a room with myself and Gerry Adams, the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister in Downing Street.”

Mr McGuinness was commenting a week after a series of choreographed moves designed to bolster the peace process stumbled over the issue of IRA weapons.

Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble put on hold the sequence of statements involving the two governments in London and Dublin, the IRA and Sinn Féin because of concerns that there was not enough information about the Provisionals’ third act of disarmament.

Mr Trimble wanted more detail about the process of putting arms beyond use and the size of the IRA’s arsenal.

In a statement today, Downing Street admitted that there would not be political progress in Northern Ireland until after next month’s crucial Assembly vote.

However, the government insisted that the Good Friday Agreement would remain the template for achieving political progress after the election.

Its statement said that the government would “seek after the elections urgently to create the conditions which will enable a working executive to be formed”.

“We remain optimistic that this will be achievable, building on the progress we have made in the last week.”