Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 23:17:11 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: IRA must declare truce says - Irish minister (fwd)




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Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 15:03:13 -0500 (CDT)
From: Chegitz Guevara <mluziett-AT-shrike.depaul.edu>
To: "lists -- Conference iww.news" <iww-news-AT-igc.apc.org>,
    Marxism <marxism-AT-jefferson.village.virginia.edu>,
    Marxism 2 <marxism2-AT-jefferson.village.virginia.edu>,
    cflist <marxchat-AT-stud.unit.no>, SLDRTY-L <SLDRTY-L-AT-LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
Subject: IRA must declare truce says - Irish minister (fwd)


Marc, "the Chegitz," Luzietti
personal homepage: http://shrike.depaul.edu/~mluziett
political homepage: http://shrike.depaul.edu/~mluziett/chegitz.html

fnord

---------- Forwarded message ----------
IRA must declare truce says - Irish minister

    By Andrew Hill

    BELFAST, Northern Ireland (Reuter) - Irish Foreign Mnister Dick Spring
Sunday rejected appeals by Sinn Fein, the Irish Republican Army's
political wing, to break the link between a new IRA truce and Sinn Fein's
participation in Northern Ireland peace talks. 

    Spring told Irish radio that the Dublin government, Britain's partner
in the quest for a lasting Northern Ireland settlement, would stick by its
demands that the guerrillas renew their cease-fire to earn Sinn Fein a
place at the June 10 talks. 

    He was apparently reacting to an appeal Saturday by Sinn Fein
president Gerry Adams, who said the Irish government had a
``constitutional imperative'' to ensure that Sinn Fein was present at the
talks without any preconditions. 

    The Irish constitution lays claim to the British province of Northern
Ireland and Adams said the Dublin government had an obligation to ensure
that Northern Ireland's Roman Catholic Irish nationalists were represented
at the talks. 

    Adams said his party, which seeks the reunification of Ireland, won a
powerful mandate elections last week to a Peace Forum to function
alongside the talks and should be allowed to take part in the negotiations
like every other Forum party. 

    But the British and Irish governments say they will bar Sinn Fein
until its IRA supporters renew a 17-month truce that was broken in
February with bomb attacks in London. Renewal of the cease-fire, they say,
would prove that Sinn Fein is a democratic political party. 

    Spring said the Dublin government had taken a ``very clear and
consistent, and morally correct'' position on a new truce by the Irish
Republican Amry. 

    A fresh appeal for an IRA cease-fire is likely to be made when Spring
meets Britain's Northern Ireland Secretary, Sir Patrick Mayhew, in London
Tuesday to put the finishing touches to the agenda for the talks. 

    Mayhew Saturday made a U-turn on British government policy by
announcing that the IRA would not be expected to start surrendering arms
as soon as the June 10 talks started but would have to begin the process
of ``decommissioning'' soon thereafter. 

    But he insisted that Sinn Fein would not get to the talks without an
IRA cease-fire first. 

    Spring, whose officials have been in constant touch with their British
counterparts on ways to persuade the IRA to renew their truce, said he
found Mayhew's ideas realistic. 

    But Mayhew's stand angered Northern Ireland's Protestant Unionists,
who fear that the talks process is a way to appease 25 years of IRA
violence and end the province's British status. 

    The two main Unionist groupings, the Ulster Unionist Party of David
Trimble and the Democratic Unionist Party of Reverend Ian Paisley, were
consulting about the Mayhew announcement, sources close to the parties
said. 

    They said the two leaders were deeply upset by Mayhew's announcement
and planned to tackle British Prime Minister John Major about it at what
could be stormy London talks this week. 

    Major has pledged that he will not allow disarming guerrillas to bog
down what he has called the best chance for peace but Unionists say they
will not negotiate with Sinn Fein until the IRA starts disarming and
disbanding. 

    Sources close to the talks said Mayhew and Spring were likely to
announce a role for former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell Tuesday, ending weeks
of speculation. 

    Mitchell, President Clinton's Ireland envoy, suggested in January that
the IRA and its Protestant Loyalist counterparts disarm in stages as the
talks progress to break deadlock over Britain's demands that they disarm
before the talks begin. 

    ``Senator Mitchell is a very respected individual with the capacity to
help both governments in the situation we are facing. We would like to see
a very strong role for him,'' Spring said.




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