Attempts to alter Good Friday deal must be resisted: McGuinness

The British government was today told to resist efforts by hardline unionists to alter the Good Friday Agreement.

Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness issued the call as Northern Ireland Secretary Paul Murphy prepared to meet Irish foreign minister Brian Cowen in Dublin about next month’s review of the Agreement.

The Mid Ulster MP, who was participating in a session on the peace process at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, said those taking part in the discussion felt “the massive gains and progress which we have made over the past 10 years cannot be squandered in the time ahead.

“The British government cannot allow an anti-Agreement minority to override the wishes of the vast majority of the people of Ireland.

“The British should immediately lift their unilateral suspension of the political institutions and proceed with the agenda of change which they committed themselves to over five years ago in the Good Friday Agreement.”

Northern Ireland’s Assembly and power-sharing executive were suspended in 2002 amid allegations of IRA spying at Stormont.

Efforts to revive power-sharing have tripped up twice in the past year over unionist concerns about the IRA’s commitment to the peace process.

There is also increasing anxiety among nationalists about the review of the Agreement, which is due to start on February 3 under the joint chairmanship of Irish and British ministers.

The SDLP on Wednesday said the British government must not “indulge” the Reverend Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionists’ desire to renegotiate the Agreement now that it was Northern Ireland’s largest party following November’s Assembly election.

Alex Attwood said the SDLP had warned the Irish Government ahead of today’s British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference that it was “their responsibility to make sure that Downing Street does not slow down” the Agreement.

He added: “It is their responsibility to make sure that the message goes out loud and clear that the DUP is not going to be given space in order to further upset politics on this island.”

Today’s talks between Mr Murphy and Mr Cowen came as Irish Government officials were preparing for a landmark meeting next week between Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and Mr Paisley.

The meeting is expected to take place in the Irish Embassy in London, possibly next Thursday.

DUP sources said arrangements had not yet been finalised.

As Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams met senior politicians in Washington last night, DUP deputy leader Peter Robinson warned republicans his party would adopt a tougher stance than Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble on the need for them to choose between guns and government.

The East Belfast MP told a party rally in Lisburn: “Unionism is under new management.

“The new regime will not succumb to the blackmail of paying a ransom to reduce terrorist activity.

“Completion means completion. Holding on to weapons of mass destruction is not an option, Mr Adams.

“These illegal weapons have murdered thousands. You will not get into government carrying them with you. You choose, Mr Adams: is it guns or government?

“Equally, the operations of terror must be a thing of the past – no training, no targeting, no gangsterism, no drug dealing, no racketeering, no bombing, no shooting, no exiling, no weapons development, no recruiting for terrorists, no intelligence gathering, no orchestrating interface violence and urging others to act as terror surrogates.

“Do you get the message, Mr Adams, a total end to republican terrorism and criminality? You choose, Mr Adams. Is it the Armalite or the ballot box?”