Britain closes Northern Ireland Assembly, plans election to decide fate of power-sharing

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) _ Britain shut down Northern Ireland's legislature Tuesday and planned a new election to determine the fate of power-sharing, the central goal of the peace accord for

Tuesday, January 30th 2007, 8:05 am

By: News On 6

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) _ Britain shut down Northern Ireland's legislature Tuesday and planned a new election to determine the fate of power-sharing, the central goal of the peace accord for this British territory.

The closure of the Northern Ireland Assembly _ a 108-member body elected in 2003 but which failed to form an administration _ will permit Protestant and Catholic parties to campaign for stronger mandates in a March 7 election.

The governments of Britain and Ireland want the next assembly to form a Catholic-Protestant coalition a week later. Britain would hand over control of most Northern Ireland departments March 26 _ a deadline that both governments insist must be met, otherwise the assembly will be closed again the next day.

At Stormont, the assembly building in Belfast, party officials dumped their files into boxes, downloaded computer files and handed in security passes.

``It is a sad day for people who aren't running again or, more cruelly, who haven't been selected,'' said Seamus Murphy, a press officer for the Social Democratic and Labour Party, which represents moderate Catholic opinion. ``But most of us are eager to get out there with the voters.''

An experts' report also being published Tuesday documents the deepening commitment to peace of the Irish Republican Army since 2005, when the group disarmed and officially abandoned its decades-old goal of overthrowing Northern Ireland by force.

Two British and Irish government officials told The Associated Press the report by the Independent Monitoring Commission offers a uniformly upbeat assessment of the IRA's retreat from violence and crime.

They said the four-man panel _ among them former chiefs of Scotland Yard's anti-terror unit and the CIA _ had found no evidence that the IRA was still smuggling fuel and cigarettes, and attacking criminal rivals. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not supposed to discuss the report's contents in advance.

Such moves are critical to the revival of power-sharing between Northern Ireland's two biggest parties: the Protestants of the Democratic Unionists and the Catholics of the IRA-linked Sinn Fein.

The last coalition collapsed in 2002 over arguments about the IRA's future. Since then, Democratic Unionist leader Ian Paisley has stressed he will cooperate only after Sinn Fein accepts British law and order.

Sinn Fein took a big step Sunday when a party conference voted to begin cooperating with the Police Service of Northern Ireland.

However, Sinn Fein made this move conditional on the Democratic Unionists' acceptance of the March 26 deadline. Paisley has refused to make that promise.

Paisley did concede that the Sinn Fein move was significant because the once-revolutionary party was accepting the legitimacy of Northern Ireland and its institutions.

``We have made headway. I wouldn't deny that,'' said Paisley, who has opposed compromise with Catholics since the start of the Northern Ireland conflict. ``If you had told me 20 years ago that they would be repudiating the very fundamentals of Sinn Fein-IRA, I would have laughed. But that is what they have done.''

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams said he expected his supporters to begin telling police about crimes in IRA strongholds.

``Sinn Fein will be urging and encouraging victims and citizens to cooperate with the police. There is no equivocation or qualification on this,'' Adams said.

The U.S. envoy for Northern Ireland, Mitchell Reiss, welcomed Adams' words as he arrived in Ireland to join the diplomatic push for power-sharing.

Reiss, who met Ahern and other senior Irish officials in the border town of Dundalk, said Washington ``commends the leadership of Gerry Adams in bringing the (Sinn Fein-IRA) movement to this historic moment.''

Reiss appealed to the Democratic Unionists to confirm they will form a Cabinet alongside Sinn Fein March 26.