Trimble skips Stormont talks

The Ulster Unionist leader, David Trimble, stayed away from last Thursday’s roundtable talks at Stormont that were intended to revive devolution in Northern Ireland, party sources indicated.
With efforts to restore the Assembly, power-sharing government and other institutions intensifying at Stormont, UUP sources believe Trimble will insist that the talks are a “sham process.”
“The only important talks are in Downing Street,” Trimble said. “UUP sources believe the party should stay away from any talks focusing on issues other than decommissioning and paramilitaries.”
Trimble and his colleagues walked out of the discussions before Christmas in protest over a leaked Irish government document that revealed London believed the IRA was still targeting and recruiting.
Speaking in London last Thursday, after he met the taoiseach and before the taoiseach met the British prime minister, Tony Blair, Trimble said the British and Irish governments still do not have a deal to put to the parties.
Ahern said there are still difficulties ahead but both governments were “full of determination to complete the outstanding issues.”
Said Trimble: “We have charted out a work program for the next few weeks for ourselves, to intensify our efforts, to pick up from the difficulties that we had late last year.”
The Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, continued to say that the IRA would “respond imaginatively” if unionists and the British government implemented the agreement.
“Clearly if a British government is serious about completing its obligation then it puts a huge onus on republicans to be imaginative,” he told the Manchester Guardian newspaper.
Adams said he wants Blair to give a guarantee that the British government will not suspend the power-sharing institutions at Stormont again. He also wants to see a full introduction of the Patten reforms on policing and a scaling down of Britain’s military presence.
Elections to the Assembly in May could make the political situation worse unless the parties agreed to a deal, he said, adding that “there is great concern about what the consequences will be of an election if nothing is sorted out.”