Republican sources last night said suggestions that the IRA could decommission within the next two months should not be dismissed. The middle-ranking sources said that while they were not aware of immediate plans to decommission, arms had been moved in recent months and this could be in preparation for decommissioning.
Yesterday's Daily Express quoted senior British government sources as saying the IRA might hand over some weapons before the Northern Ireland Assembly reconvenes in September.
The republican sources said that while the IRA would never decommission its entire arsenal, a section could be handed over to ease pressure on the North's First Minister, Mr David Trimble, from opponents of the agreement.
Mr Trimble is expected to meet serious dissension from within his party's ranks if he attempts to allow Sinn Fein into government without prior decommissioning.
The republican sources said arms had recently been moved from dumps in the Republic to the North. "Virtually everything has gone," one said. "The leadership has lost almost the entire membership in the South to the dissidents. It wanted to move the arms back into safe hands in the North. It has to have easy access if it is to decommission."
The source also said that throughout the year, weapons had been moved from local dumps to central dumps in the North. "It ensures total control by the leadership," he added.
Some IRA members in Belfast had been told to prepare for a return to violence if the Drumcree march was let through, but the British government's refusal to reverse the Parades Commission's decision and the wave of disgust which followed the murder of the Quinn brothers has lifted the pressure from the leadership.
Another republican source described as "highly significant" the statement in last month's Financial Times by the IRA commander in the Maze, Padraic Wilson, that he was hopeful decommissioning would take place.
"I have no knowledge of any immediate plans to decommission but Padraic Wilson wouldn't have said something like that off the top of his head. All the signs are pointing towards decommissioning." The statement was widely regarded as a means of acclimatising republican grassroots to eventual decommissioning.
A Downing Street spokesman yesterday welcomed "signals" that the IRA might be ready to hand over some weapons, but he added that although the mechanisms were in place for decommissioning, it was not yet clear how this would happen.
"It is true there have been signals that we welcome," he said. "We have been able to put the mechanisms in place for decommissioning to happen. We want it to happen as soon as possible. There are signals that they [the IRA] are aware of the importance of this. They accept it as part of the agreement. How it is going to happen is not yet clear."
The head of the international decommissioning body, Gen John de Chastelain, said he believed arms would be surrendered by the target date of May 22nd, 2000. But if paramilitaries did not hand in some weapons before the middle of next year, it would be difficult for the process to work, he told BBC Radio Ulster.
"Our perspective is that it is going to happen and, we feel, sooner rather than later," he said. Gen de Chastelain said he would like to see some weapons handed over before the Assembly reconvened, and stressed that if arms were not handed in before the middle of next year it would make political progress in Northern Ireland more difficult.
"If it goes well into next year and we have nothing, it will be difficult for politicians to accept that there is good will on the part of the paramilitaries," he said. "The history of what happens in Northern Ireland would indicate that once a paramilitary group says it is going to do something, it does it."