Sinn Féin accused of taking eye off the ball

Sinn Féin appears to have taken its eye off the ball in defending the interests of nationalists and supporters of the Good Friday Agreement in talks to revive power sharing at Stormont, a rival claimed today.

Nationalist SDLP leader Mark Durkan hit out at Sinn Féin's handling of the negotiations involving the British and Irish governments and the Reverend Ian Paisley's DUP in recent weeks, accusing them of being more preoccupied with the image of the IRA than with what was good for the Agreement.