The Ulster Unionist MP for East Derry, Mr William Ross, has said that Sinn Fein's admission to all-party talks should be re-examined if it emerges that the IRA was responsible for a "punishment" shooting in north Belfast and a robbery in Co Tyrone.
A man was shot in the leg in the Ardoyne area of Belfast on Tuesday night. Near Plumbridge, Co Tyrone, yesterday an armed gang held up a Royal Mail delivery van and escaped with around £250,000. No group admitted responsibility for the attacks.
"I believe that they could well be IRA-connected," Mr Ross said. "If that is the case, then it must be asked whether the entrance of Sinn Fein/IRA into the talks process was premature." Mr Ross, who has expressed serious reservations about the UUP's taking part in negotiations with republicans, said that if the IRA had carried out the attacks, then Sinn Fein was in breach of the Mitchell Principles of democracy and non-violence.
"Those principles were meant to ensure an end to `punishment' beatings and shootings, robberies, and all violence," he said. "It is a grave development if that has not happened. Unionists will be watching coming events with interest. We will see if a conspiracy of silence emerges to conceal the truth or whether there is a facing up to reality."
Mr Ross declined to comment on an article he wrote which appeared in the Daily Telegraph on Tuesday in which he argued that unionist participation in talks would yield few benefits and would only confuse party supporters. He wrote that people who were sceptical about the process were accused of not wanting peace and of exposing divisions within unionism.
"In my experience, however, a failure to ask questions about critical issues can in the long term be far, far worse," he said. "A failure to do so means that a party can embark on a course of action whose consequences have not been thoroughly explored."
Many supporters took their cue from the UUP, he said. "They tend to feel that if the Unionist Party is content with what is going on, they have no need to be concerned. But I fear their reaction when they eventually discover the extent to which our core beliefs will have been diluted to `keep the show on the road'. "
It was presumed that a "sensible, widely acceptable settlement" was possible in the North. "But this is not the case. Sinn Fein/IRA is not a normal political party. Its members are ideologues driven by their desire to create a united republican Ireland at all costs. Such people are not in the business of compromise.
"Despite this, unionists have already made major concessions to facilitate the government's forlorn efforts to draw Sinn Fein/IRA into democratic politics."