SF leaders to push home significance of arms move

Senior members of the Sinn Féin leadership are fanning out across the country and beyond today to push home the significance of the IRA's decommissioning move.

Party officials are also meeting the rank and file to calm nerves in the wake of the DUP's almost total rejection of the initiative.

The IRA announced the complete destruction of its arsenal yesterday, but the DUP said the process was not transparent, despite being overseen by five highly respected witnesses.

Today, Martin McGuinness is due to visit Washington to sell the decommissioning move to senior US politicians, as well as Irish-Americans.

Gerry Adams, meanwhile, is due to attend the National Ploughing Championships in Cork along with Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin, Mitchel McLaughlin and Michelle Gildernew.

Sinn Féin has already said that the onus is now on the Irish and British governments to put pressure on the DUP to share power with nationalists and to implement as much of the Good Friday Agreement as possible.