THE Manchester bombing showed the need for decommissioning to be at the top of the agenda in the peace talks, unionist spokesmen said at the weekend.
The Ulster Unionist Party Mr David Trimble, called a security crackdown to ensure that the IRA would not bomb its way to the table. He said the bomb meant his party would keep decommissioning at the top of its agenda in the talks.
The secretary of the Democratic Unionist Party, Mr Nigel Dodds, said in a statement "After Manchester there can now be no equivocation over the need for the issue of decommissioning to be right at the top of the talks agenda.
"The issue cannot be sidelined shunted down some side alley as the British and Dublin governments, the nationalists and the fringe loyalists propose."
Asked to comment on the attack, the Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, said "Let's record in the first instance at a personal, as well as political level, our shock and regret that people have been injured.
"Let's see exactly who was involved and let's tell the world that Sinn Fein's task and challenge and it should be the task and challenge of all other political leaderships as well is to seek the restoration of the peace process.
"Whatever the cause of this bomb, Sinn Fein's focus remains firmly fixed on the need to restore the peace process and we will not be deflected from that task."
Everyone committed to a lasting peace should apply themselves with greater determination to restoring the peace process. "There is no way forward except through inclusive dialogue," Mr Adams said.
The SDLP leader, Mr John Hume, expressed his "total and unequivocal condemnation" of the attack, which he said made no contribution to solving the Northern conflict.
"Such violence must not he allowed to impede the serious efforts we are now involved in with both governments towards a political settlement and lasting peace."
The SDLP chairman, Mr Jonathan Stephenson, said Sinn Fein demanded that others respect its mandate, but the same party ignored the wishes of 95 per cent of the people on the island of Ireland who consistently voted for parties opposed to political violence.
"That demand that others respect their mandate sits very uneasily with the IRA bombing of Manchester, or the shooting of Garda McCabe, however unauthorised. Presumably Gerry Adams is politically authorised to repudiate and `renounce' one but only to regret the other," Mr Stephenson said.
The leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, the Rev Ian Paisley expressed his "deepest revulsion and anger" at the bombing of which he described as "a devilish action".
"The explosion proves the point that we have made from the very beginning that there can be no terrorist organisation so wholly committed to getting its own way by whatever means," Dr Paisley said.
There was sharp reaction also from the Progressive Unionist Party, whose spokesman, Mr David Ervine, called for a "physical" response from the two governments.
The two governments, who have pandered to the monster, must now deal with the monster. No more honeyed words, no more condemnations. They must do something about it, something physical about it he said.
The leader of the Ulster Democratic Party, Mr Gary McMichael, expressed the hope that the peace process could be kept alive. His UDP colleague, Mr Joe English, described the bombing as "a very serious development". He said loyalists would be "studying the situation" very carefully.
The Archbishop of Armagh, Dr Robin Eames, sent a message of sympathy to the people of Manchester "Virtually everyone in Northern Ireland condemns this vicious atrocity and the injuries it has caused," he said.
"In this province, we know only too well the tragic consequences of terrorism and, at this time of searching for a political way forward, our hearts and minds reach out to the people of Manchester. Nothing can possibly justify or excuse this outrage in your city."