February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Jack Holland
As what his been called the "moment of truth" talks continued in an attempt to save the Good Friday agreement, speculation was growing that the IRA was preparing to concrete over selected arms dumps to fulfill their commitment to put arms "completely and verifiably" beyond use.
In a statement, Gerry Adams the president of Sinn Fein, said that: "The IRA are not sheep. It is not possible and it is not the responsibility of the Sinn Fein leadership to deliver the IRA on British or Unionist terms."
Though this appeared to negate any hope of an IRA arms move, those used to parsing republican messages noted that Adams’s remarks did not categorically rule out decommissioning, only that it will not take place on British or Unionist terms.
"It’s possible they’ll seal a bunker or two under supervision of the Independent International Body on Decommissioning," a reliable security source said. But the source did not suggest anything spectacular was expected anytime soon.
Meanwhile, security forces in Northern Ireland are concerned about intelligence suggesting that the Real IRA is planning a province-wide bombing campaign aimed at the commercial hearts of Northern Ireland towns. Previously, the organization, which killed 29 people in an attack in Omagh in 1998, the worst single incident in the history of the Troubles, had concentrated its attacks on security force bases.
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Concerns are still strong about the military capacity of the real IRA, and its efforts to acquire weaponry to launch an armed campaign. Last week, three men from County Louth were arrested in Slovakia and were believed to have been on a Real IRA arms-buying trip. On Monday, Irish police uncovered a dump with 20 mortars, and others holding firearms, rockets and rocket launchers, in County Kildare. All have been linked to the dissident group, which has rejected the peace process.
Attention remains fixed on the peace process talks, which were moved this week to Weston House, a secluded venue not far from Birmingham in the English Midlands, where the media is being kept outside a five-mile radius. The British and Irish governments are trying to resolve the three outstanding issues of the peace process, all of which have been linked in way that was not foreseen when the agreement was signed in 1998. They are: decommissioning of paramilitary weapons, demilitarization of British security apparatus, and concessions on policing reform to bring the new Police Service of Northern Ireland more in line with the Patten Report, as read by the Sinn Fein and the SDLP.
The key to a resolution of these contentious issues lies in the deal worked out over a year ago in Hillsborough, just south of Belfast, when two days of intensive talks took place. These were aimed at reestablishing the government that the British had suspended the previous February rather than allow David Trimble, the first minister, to resign. The deal hammered out allowed the executive to re-form.
An IRA statement of May 6 that year said: "The full implementation on a progressive and irreversible basis by the two governments, especially the British government, of what they have agreed will provide a political context, in an enduring political process, with the potential to remove the causes of the conflict and in which Irish republicans and unionists can, as equals, pursue our respective political objectives peacefully."
What followed remains crucial to understanding the IRA position. It said: "In that political context the IRA leadership will initiate a process that will completely and verifiably put IRA arms beyond use . . . "
A few weeks later, the first inspection of the arms dumps took place.
The question for the current talks is can that "political context" be re-created? What exactly it consists of is not known, but an intelligent guess can be made. It would entail (at the very least) the dismantling of the British army security apparatus in republican-controlled areas such as South Armagh, and a rejigging of the new police force to meet Sinn Fein criticisms.
If the negotiations were just between Sinn Fein and the British, such a deal no doubt could be effected. But it is difficult to see how it can be sold to the Ulster Unionist Party, especially now that hard-liners Jeffrey Donaldson and David Burnside are at Trimble’s side. They are there to make sure that he gives no further concession without a major move from the IRA. It is unlikely that they would be satisfied with concreting over an arms dump or two.