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IRA disarms

Move to be verified by church witnesses

By Noel McAdam (Belfast Telegraph)

26 September 2005
History was being made today as the International Decommissioning body confirmed that the Provisional IRA has put its arsenal beyond use.

General John de Chastelain and his two fellow commissioners were briefing the British and Irish Governments this morning ahead of publicly announcing this afternoon that the IRA has disarmed.

Their assessment will then be verified, at least in part, by separate statements from the independent Catholic and Protestant witnesses - Redemptorist priest Father Alex Reid and former Methodist President, the Reverend Harold Good.

It remained to be seen, however, how much detail the Commissioners and the witnesses would be able to give - and the degree to which their assessments would satisfy unionists.

A key element will be whether an inventory of IRA weaponry and ammunition will be provided - although the DUP was told after the Leeds Castle talks that that would only come when all paramilitary groups have decommissioned.

The Provo arsenal is thought to have included stockpiles of Kalashnikov rifles, mortars, machine guns, Semtex explosives and ammunition - but it remains unclear whether the Commissioners and witnesses will be able to reveal in detail what has been put 'beyond use' - and how it was done.

The stage could be set for further disputes, however, depending on the scale and nature of weapons decommissioned.

Nevertheless, the move was being hailed as significant and historic by many commentators.

The British and Irish Governments were expected to issue their responses - and a further statement was also anticipated from the IRA.

But the DUP appeared to be preparing to dismiss the IRA move as inadequate because of insufficient transparency and evidence of what exactly has transpired.

DUP leader Reverend Ian Paisley declined to make any immediate comment today but his deputy, Peter Robinson, said republicans must ensure that the transparency of decommissioning is maximised.

And even if decommissioning was properly unveiled, he warned, it alone was not the "trigger" for devolution. His party would still require that all IRA paramilitary and criminal activity had ended and time to assess whether promises to this effect were being implemented.

"To the extent that republicans bowl short on any and all of these issues they, and they alone, will have contributed to delaying the devolving of powers to a local administration," he said.

Senior Sinn Fein negotiator, Martin McGuinness, said, however, the formal end of the IRA campaign would place a huge responsibility on the leadership of the DUP to "re-engage in the political process".

General de Chastelain, Andrew Sens and recently re-appointed third commissioner, Tauno Nieminen, who make up the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning, have been overseeing the latest 'event' since the beginning of this month.

Today's report, sent to the two Governments before being made public, comes almost exactly two months after the Provisionals' July 28 statement that its units were standing down.

Most of the decommissioning is thought to have taken place in the Republic but it remained unknown today how many disarmament events and sites were involved.

Secretary of State, Peter Hain, who is expected to unveil the details of a number of already-announced initiatives to boost unionist confidence later this week, said republicans had to deliver on their promises.

But once unionists knew decommissioning had been credible and had been put in place, moves could then be made towards restoring devolved government in Northern Ireland, he said.

The next two reports from the Independent Monitoring Commission, the second not expected until around next January, will be "critical benchmarks," Mr Hain has said.