Adams says North talks have become a farce

The Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, said the talks on the future of the Good Friday agreement had descended into farce, expressing his concern at the failure to inject a new momentum into the peace process.
He said Sinn Fein had pressed for a “two-pronged approach” from the British and Irish governments to restore devolution and honor outstanding commitments under the Good Friday agreement. But, he added: “Instead we have a review which is now little more than a farce and even that has been cancelled until after Easter. The two governments have to come up with a more focused structure if they really want to make progress.”
Adams’s comments came after the SDLP’s senior negotiator, Sean Farren, expressed a similar concern that the review of the agreement was drifting. Speaking after bilateral talks with Sinn Fein, Farren said the SDLP wanted “urgency” to be injected into the review. “At the moment, we have a senseless drift. The governments are not even holding any meetings this week,” he said.
The British and Irish governments are not planning any meetings with the parties over the next two weeks.
“Talking is good, but what we really need are outcomes,” Farren said. “Without greater urgency, the review will be yet another lost opportunity. We need a clear structure and time-scale and parties engaging with each other on all aspects.”
Adams has also rounded on the DUP, which, he claimed, had yet to demonstrate they were willing to positively engage with the peace process or the political institutions created by the agreement.
“The DUP terms for talking to Sinn Fein are totally unacceptable. The failure of the two governments to honor their commitments under the agreement . . . reinforces the DUP in this position.
“Why should the DUP properly engage at all when by doing nothing they can veto progress?” asked Adams.
Meanwhile, the DUP Euro candidate, Jim Allister, said his party’s real enemy in the elections was Sinn Fein. “They stand posed to devour the SDLP vote and in so doing hope to top the poll and thereby score their greatest propaganda coup to date.”
He suggested that unionists should vote for the DUP to prevent this, and not waste their votes on the UUP.
Senior UUP assembly man, Michael McGimpsey, though, described calls by defectors to the DUP, Arlene Foster and Jeffrey Donaldson, for more UUP people to join them as “a cry for help from two lonely hearts.”
“The prominent and divisive voice enjoyed by the two defectors when they were in the broad-church UUP has been neutered to an insignificant squeak as they settle in to the authoritarian, control freakery-led politics that typifies the DUP.
“They miss their old friends, bless them. But the DUP is now their party and they can cry if they want to,” he said
In an angry response, Donaldson said: “I am not surprised by the bitter nature of McGimpsey’s comments as that is his style of politics. I can assure him that none of us miss him.
“The difference now is that we are listened to and do not have to go onto the offensive in the media, like we did in the UUP when we had a leadership, including Mr. McGimpsey, which had to be dragged kicking and screaming towards anything resembling a solid unionist position,” he said.
“With colleagues like Michael McGimpsey, what reason is there for the 40% opposed to Trimble to stay? It is now clear that Trimble’s cronies and policies will dominate even after he eventually goes.”