Northern Ireland

Documents & Texts from America.gov

06 April 2006
U.S. Welcomes Announcement on Northern Ireland Assembly

Washington -- The United States welcomed the announcement April 6 by British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern on restoring the Northern Ireland Assembly established by the Good Friday Agreement.

“President Bush calls on all parties to demonstrate leadership and seize this opportunity to work together to restore the power-sharing Government and resolve outstanding issues,” said a statement issued by the White House.

“In particular, we urge full support for civilian policing throughout Northern Ireland and an unequivocal commitment to the rule of law and the renunciation of all paramilitary and criminal activities,” the statement said.

The Good Friday Agreement, which was signed on April 10, 1998, was a major step in the Northern Ireland peace process. It calls for Protestants to share political power with the minority Catholics and creation of an elected Northern Ireland Assembly and other institutions. It also contains provisions on disarmament, policing reform, human rights, prisoners and demilitarization by British armed forces.

Two of the core institutions established by the accord, the Northern Ireland Assembly and its Executive, were suspended in October 2002 due to disagreements about weapons decommissioning and concerns about activities of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA).

Britain’s Blair has set a deadline of November 24 for Northern Ireland’s politicians to re-establish a power-sharing administration, according to news reports.

In July 2005, the IRA announced it would foreswear violence, and in the fall of that year it decommissioned a substantial portion of its weapons arsenal. (See related article.)

Ambassador Mitchell B. Reiss, the special envoy of the president and the secretary of state for the Northern Ireland peace process, told Congress in March that these moves raised hopes that the Good Friday accord finally would be implemented fully. At that time, however, Reiss said the peace process was at an “impasse” which he hoped would be “short-lived.” (See related article.)

The White House statement said the United States remains “steadfast in our support of the peace process and the efforts of the British and Irish Governments to achieve a lasting peace under the principles of the Good Friday Agreement.”

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)

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