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23 June 1999, Statement of policy on Decommissioning
New Dialogue's National Committee believes that the start of the Northern Ireland Executive as at present proposed must be preceded or accompanied by a significant start to the process of decommissioning paramilitary arms.
In March 1995 Gerry Adams said that decommissioning would happen at the end of all-party negotiations. In January 1996 the Mitchell Commission reported that 'there is a clear commitment on the part of those in possession of such (paramilitary) arms to work constructively to achieve full and verifiable decommissioning as part of the process of all-party negotiations'. Unless this long-standing commitment is now honoured the trust necessary for the operation of a multi-party Executive cannot be created. Some people argue that if Sinn Fein were allowed into the Executive now, decommissioning would follow. But the policy of making concessions to Sinn Fein and the IRA in the hope of a response has not worked; it seems rather to have encouraged further intransigence. At the time of the Downing Street Declaration, both the British and Irish governments insisted that decommissioning must start before Sinn Fein could enter all-party negotiations. Because everyone told them that the IRA would not decommission before tlks, the Mitchell Commission suggested the compromise that talks and decommissioning should proceed in parallel. In the event, the republicans were not held to that compromise or even to their former commitment of decommissioning at the end of the talks. Since the Good Friday Agreement the IRA has said on three occasions that it will not decommission. The only sign of some softening of that position is in a report In the Irish Times of 17 May 1999, which quotes sources as saying that 'the Provisional leadership has recently indicated it will consider some form of decommissioning gesture after Sinn Fein gets its seat in government'. That comes nowhere near to meeting the requirement of the Good Friday Agreement for complete decommissioning before 23 May 2000.
The argument that decommissioning does not matter so long as the guns are silent should also be rejected. The IRA, like its loyalist counterparts, continues to intimidate and terrorise people in the areas where it is strong by means of shootings, beatings and expulsions. Before entering the Stormont talks, Sinn Fein, in common with all the other parties committed itself 'to urge that 'punishment' killings and beatings stop and to take effective steps to prevent such actions'. Its adherence to that commitment has been half-hearted at best; these criminal acts have even been defended as 'summary Justice'. A party seeking to participate in the government of a democratic country cannot also be associated with a private army.
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