W2E-004 Mixed Ulster editorials-6.txt
political column

Summit of aspirations

Emily O'Reilly

The taoiseach has set the deadline. By nightfall on December 3rd - or whatever day his summit in Dublin with the British prime minister takes place - we shall know whether the "possibility of peace" is a reality.

Throughout Leinster House, politicians are holding their breath. Either Albert Reynolds is naive or, in his 35-minute, completely private meeting with John Major on the margins of the October Brussels summit, he found out something about British government intent to which no one else is privy.

The northern secretary is resisting the notion of deadlines. He is also resisting the belief of the government in Dublin that any round of talks in the old, 'three-strand' process would be largely futile without a prior cessation of violence.

Sir Patrick Mayhew wants the talks to begin anyway. If peace flows from that, well and good, he believes. If not, they may still yield other benefits.

The difference is not one of tactics, or even emphasis. When Mr Reynolds speaks of a cessation of violence, he is speaking in the first instance of a cessation of IRA violence. And he knows that persuasion alone will not win that.

To get the IRA to stop, it must be given something. And it is that'something' the British are resisting, through their insistence that a cessation of violence should not be the main priority.

The taoiseach has already ruled out a British declaration of intent to withdraw by a certain date. He knows it's not on, and he knows that such a declaration would further inflame a murderously sensitive situation.

His government does, however, want the British to make a declaration. What this is it will not spell out in public but, at the very least, it wants the British to get off the neutral fence and become proactive in the drive for a solution.
If the British remain neutral, the republic's government fears that the status quo will remain, that the talks will end up in the same cul-de-sac as before - and that violence on both sides will increase.
Dick Spring's six principles do not, according to the Sinn F&/ein president, Gerry Adams, address the fundamentals of the Hume-Adams plan. They do not contain a mechanism by which the unionists could be compelled to look for a solution outside the narrow framework of an internal settlement.

Yet it is clear from government sources in Dublin that the taoiseach and the t&/anaiste realise that just such a dynamic must be part of any new framework for progress worked out by both government.

One possibility is contained in a draft document from the republic's side, leaked to me last month. This talks of a "reciprocal endorsement" of the constitutional positions of both governments, in which the republic would reaffirm its commitment to the no-change-without-consent principle on the north. In that context, it suggests, the British would "acknowledge the full legitimacy and value of the goal of Irish unity by consent, cherished by the greater number of people living in Ireland, and the consequential need for practical provisions to give that objective equally meaningful operational expression and opportunity, including in any future structures within Northern Ireland and between North and South".

In public at least, there is no sign that the British want to play ball, despite Mr Major's honeyed words in the Guildhall. While welcome, from Dublin's point of view, in tone and emphasis - plus the deliberate use of language similar to that of Mr Reynolds and Mr Spring - the speech contained nothing new.

Privately, British officials say that their government is not about to join the ranks of the 'persuaders'. This implies that it is content to remain neutral, focus exclusively on the talks process and hope for the best.

But if John Hume has done nothing else, he has at least convinced the republic's government that the talks process is insufficient on its own, and that only a separate, British-backed initiative can break the logjam.

To date, Dublin's strategy has been to sweet-talk the British and the unionists and risk short-term nationalist alienation for the sake of longer-term nationalist gain. The assurances to the unionists, topped up with a stated willingness to neuter articles 2 and 3, should, they hope, put pressure on the British to reciprocate.
