Only peaceful SF can return to power sharing - Blair

Tony Blair today said that Sinn Féin could only return to power sharing government in Northern Ireland as long as it was committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means.

The British Prime Minister said steps taken by the British government to scale back the military presence in the North following the IRA’s announcement that it had ended the arms struggle were fully justified in security terms.

His comments following meetings with Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams and the Democratic Unionist leader Ian Paisley were intended to reassure worried unionists alarmed at the speed of the British government’s response.

The Prime Minister however insisted the IRA’s announcement had not changed the basis of the peace process in Northern Ireland.

In return for the adoption by all parties and all people – particularly, obviously, republicans – of exclusively democratic means there can be power-sharing, he said.

“You cannot have the institutions in Northern Ireland back up and running except on the basis that it is clear in word and in deed that exclusively peaceful means are the only way to achieve progress.”

He said moves to remove British army watchtowers and to disband the three home based regiments of the Royal Irish Regiment were justified in the light of the current security situation.

“These are things that are justified and actually have been justified for some time in security terms. With the IRA’s statement we can implement that but that has not been forced politically against the security wishes of the police or the (British) army,” he said.

“Obviously you have to mark carefully what happens. You had the IRA’s statement but you then have got to make sure that what has been said in theory is carried through in practice.”