| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Mr. Wilshire: May I be clear about what I have just heard? Did I hear it stated that it is a clear, firm policy of the Ulster Unionist party that it will not sit in an Executive with Sinn Fein-IRA until decommissioning in a substantial form has started?
Mr. Taylor: Absolutely. Decommissioning in a credible form must have taken place before we accept
Sinn Fein-IRA in an Executive in Northern Ireland. I would have hoped that the hon. Gentleman realised that that has been our policy from the outset.
Mr. Hunter: May I press the right hon. Gentleman further? Total commitment to non-violence and democracy must surely mean total disarmament. We are not talking about a few weapons or a few ounces, pounds or tonnes of Semtex in that context. It is total commitment and therefore total disarmament.
Mr. Taylor: When someone tells me what total disarmament is, I will understand what that intervention means. It all depends on one's knowledge of how many illegal armaments there are in Northern Ireland. There cannot be total disarmament until we are aware of the total number of illegal arms. Let us not pursue that. We want credible disarmament so that the people of Northern Ireland can see that decommissioning is under way. Let us not quibble over other words.
Decommissioning is an important issue in Northern Ireland. We very much welcome the intervention of the Dublin Prime Minister, Mr. Bertie Ahern. He analysed the situation accurately, but he is not on his own. As has been mentioned, the Deputy Prime Minister of the south of Ireland did so in Australia last week. Significantly, the annual conference of the Fine Gael party, the main Opposition party which could well form the next Dublin Government, unanimously passed a motion, Saturday week ago, that there must be decommissioning for Sinn Fein to get into the Executive in Northern Ireland. I hope that there will be similar statements from London and Washington in coming weeks.
I am disappointed because I think that Sinn Fein-IRA are not taking this issue seriously. The leader of Sinn Fein, who was elected as a Member of Parliament but has refused to take his seat, Mr. Gerry Adams, is not in Northern Ireland; he is in Australia. He will be away for 10 days, and then he is going on to celebrate St. Patrick's day in the United States. Yet 10 March has been stated by the Secretary of State as the deadline to get the Executive up and moving in Northern Ireland. It seems to me that Sinn Fein-IRA are not taking the issue of decommissioning seriously. If that is so, I regret to say that an impasse will have been reached.
Rev. Martin Smyth:
I appreciate my right hon. Friend's giving way. He said that the whole thing could collapse in a year's time. Is there anything in the Belfast agreement that would prevent the Secretary of State, even now, from appointing to the Executive those who have honoured their commitment and leaving out those who obviously have not? One bears in mind the fact that it was not in a clandestine position that the negotiator representing Sinn Fein-IRA on decommissioning said that it was not a question of the IRA being unable to decommission, but that it would not.
Mr. Taylor:
Everything depends on one's individual interpretation of the Belfast agreement. I would think that Sinn Fein-IRA could be excluded under the terms of the Belfast agreement, but obviously the Secretary of State, at the moment, does not.
It has been said by Sinn Fein-IRA that decommissioning has not happened in other countries. It is important to place on record that some of the main
terrorist and revolutionary campaigns have resulted in decommissioning in order for political and democratic solutions to emerge and to stick. For example, Lebanon can be cited as one of the worst examples that we have had in the past 20 years. In 1989, there was an agreement whereby the green line--it ran for five miles between the Christian and Muslim territories in Beirut--was removed. It is significant that under the Taif accord, which brought about successful political reform, it was insisted that the disbandment and disarmament of all militia should take place. That disbandment and disarmament of all militia--Christian and Muslim--took place in advance of the political settlement.
Likewise in Mozambique, people were trying to get a political process under way without decommissioning. The then Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, strenuously rejected that and held fast to the point that elections could be held only after full demobilisation had taken place. In 1994, the United Nations operations in Mozambique confirmed that there had been the total disarmament of the various illegal organisations in that country.
Thirdly, I remember the troubles in El Salvador from my time as a Member of the European Parliament. Again, there was an agreement--in 1992--which brought about the total disarmament and decommissioning of illegally held weaponry, in pursuit of peace. A settlement was then achieved, so it is important to place on record the need for decommissioning for peaceful, democratic government to emerge in countries such as Lebanon, Mozambique and El Salvador.
There are places where there has not been decommissioning; one is South Africa. Anyone who has been there in the past two years will know that people now regret that they did not have decommissioning before they reached a political settlement. Now there are more illegal arms running around South Africa than there are lawful arms, and the situation is deteriorating in some of the major cities.
The order is timely. We have to achieve the beginning of credible decommissioning to achieve a political settlement in Northern Ireland. We are 95 per cent. of the way to achieving what every Member of the House would like achieve in Northern Ireland, but, at the moment, I remain unconvinced that that will happen. There is less than a 50 per cent. chance of the Belfast agreement succeeding; I still believe that Sinn Fein-IRA will not decommission and that they are determined to wreck the Belfast agreement.
Mr. David Wilshire (Spelthorne):
Before I come to the main points that I want to make, I want to pick up on what the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) said. He suggested that whereas there was in the Republic of Ireland a will to say that there would be, or should be, no entry into an Executive before decommissioning, we had not heard that sort of sentiment expressed in this House.
If I have understood the debate correctly, I have heard my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Moss) make that point absolutely and I have heard the right hon. Member for Strangford (Mr. Taylor) make the very same point--there can be no entry into an Executive before a credible start to decommissioning is made. My hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mr. Hunter) feels the same and I have made my position absolutely clear. In case I have not, let me restate that there are some Members of this House, and a large number of people in this country, who believe that it is absolutely intolerable to contemplate armed terrorists taking their seats in a democratic Government.
I tried to intervene on the Secretary of State, but was not able to do so. Therefore, I ask the Minister to make clear for this House exactly where Her Majesty's Government stand on the question of entry into an Executive before there is a start to decommissioning. This House and this country have the right to know exactly what is the Government's policy on that matter.
These are my main points. As the House will know, I was unhappy when the Northern Ireland Arms Decommissioning Act 1997 was first brought to the House and I am still unhappy about this process. I felt then, and I feel now, that the whole act of an amnesty allows bombers and murderers to get away scot free. It therefore follows that I wish we were not doing what we are doing tonight. Nevertheless, I am a democrat and I accept that it was the will of the House that the Act should be passed. I have no objection to us continuing, having started down this track. I do not intend to force a Division. The House will want to renew the order.
I have little doubt that the few of us present tonight will be back again next year and the year after to extend the period, because we are wasting our time. Sinn Fein-IRA have never had any intention of decommissioning--and they never will. Do not take my word for it: listen to Sinn Fein-IRA, which have made it clear that there will be no decommissioning. Let us come back next year and have another go, and see whether we can persuade ourselves that this is a good idea.
I understand only too well why the Government want to fudge the spirit of the Good Friday agreement. If they do that, they can justify to themselves--and they can try to justify it to the country--that they can, after all, allow armed terrorists into an Executive.
Marjorie Mowlam:
The Government are implementing the Good Friday agreement, which the party leaders in Northern Ireland agreed to and for which the people voted. The agreement says clearly--this is our position--that decommissioning must take place and the Executive must be formed. Both must happen for the Good Friday agreement to work.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |