Britain, Ireland scramble for N. Ireland solution

Suspension of provincial government looms Friday

February 9, 2000
Web posted at: 12:57 p.m. EST (1757 GMT)

In this story: Suspension 'sheer madness,' says Sinn Fein leader Bishop offers to hold arms RELATED STORIES, SITES

DUBLIN, Ireland -- British and Irish officials were close-lipped on Wednesday about frantic behind-the-scenes efforts to keep Northern Ireland's fragile government from unraveling as Britain prepared to resume direct rule over the province.

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Britain's Northern Ireland Secretary, Peter Mandelson, and Irish Foreign Minister Brian Cowen were to meet Wednesday in London, while Bertie Ahern and Tony Blair, respective prime ministers of Ireland and Britain, spoke by telephone. Blair and Ahern had no plans to meet in person.

"Following recent intensive discussions at senior official level, the minister and secretary of state will review issues at political level," Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.

Britain was set to suspend Northern Ireland's fledgling four-party government assembly on Friday after the House of Commons overwhelmingly voted to do so on Tuesday at Mandelson's request.

Mandelson told the legislators that the IRA's refusal to surrender its weapons in support of the 1998 Good Friday peace accord mandated the suspension. To fail to act would, Mandelson said, precipitate the total collapse of the government.

The government was formed late last year when leading Ulster Unionists agreed to join the assembly, along with Irish Republican Army political ally Sinn Fein, provided the IRA made tangible steps toward decommissioning, or disarmament.

A disarmament commission report released last week, however, revealed that the IRA had made no progress toward decommissioning, prompting the current crisis.

Suspension 'sheer madness,' says Sinn Fein leader

Ulster Unionist Party members, led by First Minister David Trimble -- who are fierce proponents of British rule in Northern Ireland -- threatened to resign from the Cabinet. Mandelson believes their resignation would surely collapse the assembly. With that in mind, Mandelson moved to suspend the government until a solution could be found.

Sinn Fein chairman Mitchel McLaughlin, however, argued that a suspension of the government would have the opposite effect, saying it was "sheer madness" to walk away from the government.

"Let's make this new experiment work," McLaughlin told CNN. "Let's give it more than eight weeks. Let's demonstrate to those who are skeptical that we can work together."

McLaughlin called the crisis "a bump in the road," adding that under those circumstances the British government's action was "incomprehensible."

In Washington, U.S. President Bill Clinton urged the parties to "find a way through" the impasse that threatens to derail the hard-fought peace process.

"I think everyone understands we're at a very important moment," Clinton said before departing for fund-raisers in Texas. "I just hope everyone will belly up to the bar and do their part, so that we don't have any kind of backsliding or reversal here. We've come too far."

Bishop offers to hold arms

Also on Wednesday, a leading Roman Catholic bishop in Londonderry -- which is called by its traditional name of Derry by the republicans who want one Ireland -- offered to take the IRA's weapons into his safekeeping to salvage the peace process.

"I would do this for a 12-month period, starting immediately," Bishop Seamus Hegarty said in a statement published in the Irish News.

Hegarty said he would also hold the weaponry of other paramilitary groups in the province, both republican and unionist.

Only one small pro-British group has turned in any weapons. The IRA, the focus of the current crisis, refuses to turn in its weapons but silenced its guns in 1997. Splinter groups of the IRA have, however, continued to press a violent campaign against what they see as British occupation.

The Irish Times reported on Wednesday that the governments of Ireland and Britain were looking for a solution by linking removal of British troops and security installations from the province to an IRA commitment to decommission its weapons.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Northern Ireland set to return to direct British rule
February 8, 2000
Moderate Catholic leader calls for IRA disarmament
February 7, 2000
Britain, Ireland scramble to save Northern Irish Assembly
February 2, 2000
Trimble accuses IRA of defaulting on Northern Ireland accord
February 1, 2000
British, Irish weigh report on IRA's weapons arsenal
January 31, 2000
Hopes dim for IRA disarmament peace accord
January 30, 2000

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