Adams reports 'little progress' in efforts to break impasse

Sinn Féin president Mr Gerry Adams has said talks aimed at breaking the North's political impasse have made little progress.

Sinn Féin president Mr Gerry Adams has said talks aimed at breaking the North's political impasse have made little progress.

There would only be progress if the two governments proposed an implementation plan for honouring commitments on policing, demilitarisation and other aspects of the Belfast Agreement.

"So far in our efforts to bring back the institutions, there has been no substantive progress. And there will not be until the British and Irish governments come forward with time-framed programmatic implementation plans for those aspects of the agreement which are their responsibility.

"While Sinn Féin believes the institutions need to be reinstated as soon as possible, they should not have been suspended in the first place. Even if the institutions are not reinstated, all other aspects of the agreement must be, and will be, fully implemented.

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"I say 'will be fully implemented' not because I have any great confidence in the British government ... but because there is no way we can accept anything less."

He was speaking at a public meeting last night in Fitzroy Presbyterian Church which was sponsored by the zero28 Project Citizenship. They were asked what they wanted to say to unionist/ loyalist communities and what they wanted to hear. Mr Adams said republicans were frustrated that unionist leaders had ignored the contribution they had made to the peace process, despite the difficulties it had caused them.

He said the difficulties within unionism were exacerbated by "the ongoing focus on alleged IRA activities". But there was anger among nationalists that "the ongoing killing and sectarian campaign by unionist paramilitaries" was not receiving attention.