The Ulster Unionist Party will oppose any cross-Border institutions which are devised for political rather than economic purposes as part of an agenda "to foist either political unity or joint authority on the unwilling electors of Northern Ireland", its party leader, Mr David Trimble, said.
Addressing a Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce and Industry lunch yesterday, Mr Trimble, speaking on the Northern economy, emphasised the need to tap into markets in Britain and Europe rather than in the Republic.
He said while the UUP would welcome more trade and co-operation with the Republic, it was "not necessarily" more important than co-operation with Britain, the rest of Europe or elsewhere.
Mr Trimble said there was an "important misconception" that levels of cross-Border trade were abnormally low. The truth, he said, which had been revealed in data from the Northern Ireland Economic Research Centre, was that even at the beginning of the decade, Northern Ireland producers sold three times as much per capita in the Republic as in Britain.
"There is nothing in the data which suggests any impediment in trade between Northern Ireland and the Republic on our side. Consequently, the clamour for increased trade gives rise to suspicions that it may conceal political motivations."
Mr Trimble added that he would place in this category an "infamous claim" by IBEC that normal levels of trade might lead to the creation of 75,000 extra jobs when the evidence was that normal trade levels already existed.
Mr Trimble said it was "paradoxical" that the Irish Government should make so much in the current talks of economic co-operation while it was going "to add to the differences between the two Irelands by signing up for the euro while we stay out".
He said the Northern economy was in a relatively good state. The Republic might be out-performing it in terms of GDP but unemployment in the South had risen by 26 per cent over the past five years, while it had steadily declined in the North.