An independent body to oversee the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons is to be established soon by the British and Irish governments. "You can take it as read that the decommissioning body will be in operation by September 15th," a spokesman for the Northern Ireland Office said. This is the date set for substantive negotiations in the Stormont talks.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin said: "The governments are putting in place the necessary arrangements to ensure that the Independent Commission will be in a position to commence work on a full operational basis, on the lines already indicated to the parties, when the substantive negotiations begin on September 15th."
The body was recommended in the Mitchell Report on decommissioning. Membership still has to be finalised and it is believed that possible appointees are being "sounded out" at present. The chairman is widely expected to be Gen John de Chastelain from Canada, one of the authors of the Mitchell Report who also cochairs the Stormont talks.
Meanwhile, it is understood that no immediate moves to cut sentences for paramilitary prisoners in United Kingdom jails are likely. One of the delaying factors is that an increase in remission rates would require legislation.
There has been some unionist anger over a British Home Office decision to transfer IRA prisoners in England from special secure units to less restrictive quarters.
A spokesman for the Northern Ireland Office said: "This is very much a matter for the Home Office. The downgrading of prisoners' status is kept constantly under review. It was not a result of any brokering between the [British] government and Sinn Fein."
The deputy leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, Mr John Taylor, accused the two governments of delaying the establishment of the decommissioning body, but this was firmly denied.
The NIO said the two governments in their document of July 16th had specifically stated that if their proposals on decommissioning were adopted around the table at the Stormont talks, then it should be possible to have the decommissioning body established by the end of July.
"The proposals never were adopted at the talks. Since then, the two governments have been working steadily to finalise the details which will lead up to the formal agreement putting the decommissioning body in place," the NIO spokesman said.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said: "When the governments proposed that the independent commission should be established on 24 July, it was based on the understanding that substantive political negotiations would start on the same date. Unfortunately, the governments' proposals on decommissioning were rejected by the UUP and other unionist parties."