The Belfast Agreement needs nothing less than a miracle if it is to be rescued from collapse, Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness warned today. As all sides contemplated a two-week deadline to save the devolved political regime in Northern Ireland, the leading republican said the onus was on Tony Blair and Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble to move.
His comments followed a week of bitter sectarian confrontation outside a primary school in Ardoyne, north Belfast, which at its peak saw a blast bomb explode near tearful Catholic children who ran the gauntlet through a loyalist area.
There were no protests today because of the weekend break from school and Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid said he believed there were "hopeful signs" in the highly-charged dispute.
Proposals drawn up by Dr Reid and the devolved administration were put forward yesterday and Protestant residents are to meet the Secretary of State early next week. Meanwhile Dr Reid will hold talks on Monday with Richard Haass, US President George Bush's special envoy to Northern Ireland, about the latest crisis looming over the power-sharing authority at Stormont.
Mr Haass is also set to take soundings from the pro-Agreement parties, who are still locked in the wranglings over IRA weapons, police reform and demilitarisation.
Sinn Féin's chief negotiator Mr McGuinness said today: "I think it will need nothing less than a miracle to save the Good Friday Agreement.
"It will require the British Prime Minister, who is the key player in all of this, to recognise that under no circumstances should he be selling anyone short in terms of implementation of the Agreement.
"It will take David Trimble to recognise that he must face the rejectionists in his own party." The parties and British and Irish Governments have until September 22 to persuade Mr Trimble's Ulster Unionists to fully commit to the new institutions.
Last month, Mr Trimble said an IRA deal with General John de Chastelain's decommissioning body about a method for disposing of weapons did not go far enough and he refused to return to his former role as First Minister.
Mr McGuinness told BBC Radio Ulster's Inside Politics programme he hoped Mr Trimble would recognise the "folly" of his position.
He added: "De Chastelain could have resolved the issue of arms.
"But David Trimble wasn't prepared to go with it. David Trimble wasn't prepared - along with Tony Blair - to be part of a process which would see the full implementation of the Agreement."
Meanwhile Dr Reid, spoke on the same programme of "hopeful signs" in the Holy Cross school row.
The package drawn up by Dr Reid, acting First Minister Sir Reg Empey and a representative of acting Deputy First Minister Séamus Mallon is aimed at stopping the protests as well as meeting Protestant residents' complaints of attacks from nationalists and of British government neglect.
Dr Reid said: "There are, I think, hopeful signs that people are beginning to talk together. "Certainly myself and Reg Empey and both our ministers and officials will do everything possible to foster that and facilitate that.
"But we can't dictate. There is a lesson here. We have to work at one level together to address these problems, but at a local level, it really is for the local representatives."
PA