The authorities in Northern Ireland are to take account of the IRA and loyalist ceasefires when reviewing prisoners' life sentences. Starting next month, the Life Sentence Review Board will take the "quality" and "enduring nature" of the ceasefires into consideration when making its recommendations. The decision was revealed in a letter from the Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, to Mr Gary McMichael of the loyalist Ulster Democratic Party. Dr Mowlam wrote: "I can give you an assurance that at its next meeting in October, the Life Sentence Review Board will take account of the fact of each of the ceasefires, their quality and their enduring nature in arriving at any recommendations for release."
There are 164 prisoners serving life sentences in the North on charges arising from paramilitary activity. The board will consider applications from 19 of these prisoners at its meeting.
Meanwhile, leaders of the Ulster Unionist Party and the Democratic Unionist Party met yesterday. A statement from the UUP described it as "constructive" and said the two parties would meet again shortly.
"The two parties are totally agreed that the principle of consent, which is the right of the people of Northern Ireland alone to determine their own future, is a fundamental governing principle which must apply in all circumstances. This principle must be accepted by the government and all parties.
"Our two parties are also agreed that the issue of the decommissioning, i.e. the handing over of illegal terrorist weaponry, must be resolved to their satisfaction before there could be substantive political negotiations," the UUP statement said.
The UUP also met the Workers Party for what the WP president, Mr Tom French, described as "a frank exchange of views".
In a separate development, the Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions met a delegation from Sinn Fein yesterday as part of a series of meetings with political parties.
The NICTU said it raised the issues contained in the Investing in Peace report adopted at the ICTU biennial conference in Belfast in July, including ["]"the general political scene in relation to the forthcoming talks".
The Sinn Fein chairman, Mr Mitchel McLaughlin, said his party had raised a number of issues, among them the need for all-party talks. "We also discussed the need for immediate movement on political prisoners," he said.
The Ulster Unionist MP for East Londonderry, Mr William Ross, said last night he was "firmly in the sceptics' camp" over getting into talks with Sinn Fein.
The Ulster Unionist MP for South Belfast, Mr Martin Smyth, said that without IRA decommissioning, there could be no direct negotiations with Sinn Fein, but he was in favour of the UUP remaining in the talks process.
However, the chairman of Sinn Fein in the North, Mr Gearoid O hEara, urged the Ulster Unionists "not to be intimidated by internal pressures" from engaging in face-to-face talks with his party.
"The recent remarks by some unionist MPs arguing against talking with Sinn Fein Fein are an attempt to intimidate the party leadership. These calls are totally out of step with the mood of those who vote for the Unionist Party," Mr O hEara said in a statement.