The North's Deputy First Minister, Mr Seamus Mallon, has called on the IRA to make a statement indicating that its campaign of violence is over. This would help to break the logjam over the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons, he suggested.
In an interview with The Irish Times, Mr Mallon was reluctant to suggest in detail what the IRA should say but urged the organisation to express sentiments similar to those of the Sinn Fein leader, Mr Gerry Adams, when he suggested violence was "over, done with and gone".
"I would urge that very strongly, not just for the sake of unionism. It is the requirement and the desire of the Irish people North and South that they do so and that they do so quickly. I know, because of the reaction of the Irish people in the referendum and by the reaction of people on the ground. I know that it would be welcomed very substantially in both communities in Northern Ireland."
Recalling previous hardline pronouncements on decommissioning from the IRA he said that, given the risk to the Belfast Agreement and the whole political process, the organisation "should take the opportunity of reformulating their stated position". Such a statement would foster trust among ordinary unionists in the political process and Sinn Fein.
When it was suggested that recent reports suggested any further IRA statement on decommissioning would be more hardline than before, Mr Mallon replied: "They have a very substantial role in what they say on this.
"It could have a huge bearing on the capacity that I believe could exist of getting the movements from the absolute positions into the type of formula which can keep things moving."
Responding to an Ulster Unionist statement that a hand-over of weapons and not mere words was required, he said: "I believe unionism has the capacity to move from that rigid position, if in effect they got a reciprocal type of approach from the republican movement. They both could move from those absolute positions at the same time."
Mr Mallon yesterday met a Sinn Fein delegation led by Mr Martin McGuinness. Afterwards he said: "Upholding the integrity of the agreement and the political process demands that we have the courage to take decisions which are in the interests of everyone on this island." He also met the head of the decommissioning body, Gen John de Chastelain.
See also page 16