This is a critical week indeed for the people of Northern Ireland and for the island as a whole. Mr Tony Blair and Mr Bertie Ahern will travel to Belfast later today, ahead of Wednesday's final deadline, to try to break the long-standing deadlock over the relationship between the establishment of the Executive and the decommissioning of paramilitary arms. These political talks will take place against the backdrop of the Long March to Drumcree which daily, but thankfully so far uneventfully, is winding its way towards the Garvaghy Road next Sunday.
The Independent Parades Commission is scheduled to announce its determination on the Drumcree Church parade this morning as the two heads of government prepare to meet the parties in Castle Buildings. It seems, once again, that all attempts to reach an accommodation between the Orange Order and the Garvaghy Road residents' representatives are about to fail, despite the separate weekend interventions by the Prime Minister's chief-of-staff, Mr Jonathan Powell, and the First Minister-designate, Mr David Trimble, seeking a compromise. Only if the Commission can be convinced that there is some dynamic attached to these eleventh-hour negotiations will it postpone its ruling.
It seems, at the time of writing, that it will fall to the Commission again this year to balance the conflicting rights of the Orangemen to assert their traditionality against what must be seen as the more convincing case of the residents to live peacefully and securely in their own homes without harassment and provocation. With the new rapproachment promised by the Belfast Agreement, it must be regretted that the many initiatives taken during the year to secure agreement between the Orange Order and the Garvaghy Road residents have not borne fruit. The Portadown No I District has applied to the Commission to hold the Drumcree march every single Sunday since last July and every single week it has been ruled out. At the same time, the Orange Order has refused to engage in any direct negotiations with the Commission or the residents to seek an accommodation on the route.
This bleak scenario should not take from the serious efforts made by Mr Blair's emissaries, Mr Powell and Mr Frank Blair, to engage in proximity talks between the conflicting parties for many months. Nor should it under-estimate the leadership role played by the Protestant Churches in recent months to get their members to come to terms with the implications of Drumcree for relations within the wider community. The Church of Ireland Primate, Archbishop Eames, is expected to respond shortly to the refusal by Portadown Orangemen to sign up to three pledges governing their behaviour before and after the Drumcree service planned for next Sunday.
An independent survey by the Parades Commission, published in the Belfast Telegraph a week ago, makes interesting reading. The poll showed that some 86 per cent overall agreed that there should be dialogue between the various sides in parade disputes. Some 82 per cent wanted the Orange Order to talk to the Commission. More significantly, however, while 82 per cent of Protestants were sympathetic to the loyalist orders, eight out of ten wanted dialogue between the two sides. This confirms that it is the wish of all democrats that this will be the week when, to quote the lines of Seamus Heaney, hope and history can rhyme.