Blair Seeks Unionist’s Blessing on IRA Deal

Northern Ireland’s born-again hopes for peace get an early test today in London when British Prime Minister Tony Blair woos the skeptical leader of the divided province’s Protestant majority.

David Trimble, who heads the mainstream pro-British Ulster Unionist Party, is key to Blair’s hopes that an Irish Republican Army cease-fire that went into effect Sunday can lead to a negotiated settlement ending three decades of sectarian bloodshed in Northern Ireland.

Trimble and many other Protestants who support the province’s continued union with Britain believe that Blair paid too high a price for a cease-fire that they see cynically as an IRA negotiating ploy.

Beginning today, Sinn Fein, the IRA’s political arm, will have the same access to British officials as any other political movement in Northern Ireland.

At issue for unionists--or loyalists, as they also are called--is the IRA’s arsenal of weapons, hidden in caches on both sides of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

To the fury of unionists, Blair has endorsed proposals made last year by U.S. mediator George J. Mitchell, a former Democratic senator from Maine, that the IRA surrender weapons as peace talks proceed rather than before they begin.

Under an Anglo-Irish agreement, Sinn Fein may join all-party peace talks in September if the IRA truce holds. Talks on the surrender, or “decommissioning,” of arms would take place on a parallel track to political talks, with next May being Blair’s announced deadline for final agreement on both tracks.

Anglo-Irish acceptance of “parallel decommissioning” was framed as a compromise after the IRA refused to hand over weapons to earn admission to the talks and ended an earlier 17-month cease-fire in February 1996.

In Belfast, observers say that Trimble will demand that Blair give cast-iron assurances that the IRA will be required to have disarmed completely by the time the political talks end.

“I want a position so that, if we sit down with Sinn Fein, it is clear they will be under pressure to start decommissioning straight away, and Sinn Fein will not have any excuse not to do so. At present, we have a system whereby there will be no real pressure on them to do anything,” Trimble said.

In London, British analysts predict that Blair will promise to create an independent body to oversee disarmament, using it to dissuade Trimble and other unionists from walking out of the talks.

Blair is scrambling to soothe ruffled unionist feathers, and Trimble is feeling the pressure too. Trimble will be vilified by his constituents if he allows talks to open without a strong commitment on arms. If, on the other hand, he walks away from the talks, he will be criticized for torpedoing the best chance for peace since the latest round of violence began three decades ago.

The results of today’s Blair-Trimble encounter will in great measure determine how Northern Irish Protestant parties will vote Wednesday when they are asked to approve the conditions on which Sinn Fein is scheduled to join them at the negotiating table in September.

Janet Stobart of The Times’ London Bureau contributed to this report.