Sinn Féin was sharply attacked by two senior Progressive Democrat TDs in the Dáil last night.
The Minister of State for Health, Mr Tim O'Malley, and Ms Liz O'Donnell, a former minister of state for foreign affairs, rounded on the party at the conclusion of a Private Member's Bill to enshrine neutrality in the Constitution.
Mr O'Malley said: "When delegates at the Progressive Democrats' national conference speak about 'our army', the army they have in mind is our national defence forces, the Irish Army, the organisation charged under Bunreacht na hÉireann with responsibility for the defence of this State. The same is true in the case of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Labour Party.
"But the same is not true in the case of Sinn Féin. When delegates at the Sinn Féin Ardfheis speak of the 'army', the body they are referring to is the Provisional IRA, the organisation which murdered Jerry McCabe, a brave Garda officer who gave sterling service to the people of my own city of Limerick. For Sinn Féin, unlike every other party represented in this House, is inextricably linked to a military organisation. The Provisional republican movement embraces both Sinn Féin and the Provisional IRA. I, for one, have no way of knowing where one organisation begins and where the other ends."
Mr O'Malley said everybody welcomed the fact that the Provisionals had gone on ceasefire and played such a key role in the peace process. "But that does not mean that the Provisionals have entered mainstream politics on both sides of the Border." Ms O'Donnell said the Bill had raised a few eyebrows. "The same party has, for years and with great ferocity, sought to subvert the 1937 Constitution and all it stands for, including Article 29. They worked actively against the policy of neutrality by collaborating with the Nazi regime against the State and the Government of Ireland, as well as against the democratic allied forces.
"Latterly, they pursued their alleged commitment to international peace by arms deals in the Libyan desert and in fostering ETA terrorists in a fellow EU member-state. Their claimed commitment to the demilitarisation of Europe apparently excludes the tons of Semtex in republican hands.
Their claimed commitment to the rule of law does not extend to co-operating with police investigations into the Omagh atrocity. We all know that their alleged belief in neutrality allowed republicans to shoot members of our legitimate defence forces and Garda."
Mr Martin Ferris (SF, Kerry North) accused the Government of adopting a "hysterical reaction" to the Bill by personally attacking Sinn Féin."Is it because tens of thousands of people came out on the streets last week to show you, and the establishment of Europe, that you have failed to face up to the reality that you have made terrible blunders?"
The Labour spokesman on foreign affairs, Mr Michael D. Higgins, said that although his party found the Bill seriously textually flawed, it was in favour of giving it a second reading and allowing it move on to committee stage.
The Bill was defeated by 100 votes to 35. Fine Gael voted with the Government against the Bill.
