Editorial Trimble does it again

Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more, thanks to Unionist leader and First Minister David Trimble’s announcement that he will resign on July 1 unless the IRA has begun to decommission it arms. It came the same day British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the next general election would be June 7. That the two announcements came so close together is almost certainly not a coincidence.

The UUP leader is running scared of his Unionist rivals in the Democratic Unionist Party. His warning to the IRA and Sinn Fein, he hopes, will show the Unionist hard-liners that he is not afraid to take on republicans. This might well turn out to be a terrible misjudgment on his part. Those hard-liners who are steadfastly opposed to the Good Friday agreement are not likely to be convinced now by someone who has already imposed decommissioning deadlines on the IRA only to lift them before his aim has been reached.

Those Unionists who support the agreement, while no doubt remaining sympathetic to Mr. Trimble’s dilemma, might well be further confused and discouraged from supporting a policy that could bring about the collapse of the institutions of devolved government. As for the IRA and Sinn Fein, upon them it will have no affect whatsoever, other than to give Sinn Fein an election slogan about not giving in to Unionist vetoes.

Trimble’s dilemma, however, is real, and it goes beyond electioneering stunts. The IRA has yet to make good on commitments made over a year ago. Arms have not been put beyond use, as the recent murder of Paul Daly in North Belfast last week made all too brutally clear. This alleged drug dealer was shot dead by the IRA, the armed wing of Sinn Fein. The timing of that murder, and the kind of pressure it put on Trimble, might make reasonable people conclude that there are cynical elements within the republican movement who are doing their best to damage moderate Unionism, without which this agreement cannot work.

It is apparent from these events that unless the republican movement gets over its arms fetish, then not only Trimble but the whole agreement is probably doomed.