Sir - I am disappointed that the Fine Gael Leader, Mr John Bruton TD, should choose not only to include but to highlight the peace process in a general partisan attack on the Taoiseach, at an obviously difficult and sensitive time for the peace process (The Irish Times, March 15th). The Government's efforts are entirely directed towards restoration of the institutions on a secure basis through the implementation of all aspects of the Good Friday Agreement not towards rewriting it. But of course implementation in many areas of the Agreement requires more detailed understandings and decisions, where not already reached. Mr Bruton seems to have forgotten that it was the Mitchell Review that lead to the establishment of the institutions, not the persuasion of one Government.
Without entering into recriminations it seemed very unfortunate to most people both at home and abroad that, when the IRA was adopting its most forward position to date on the arms issue, the decision was taken to suspend institutions that had only been eight or nine weeks in existence, especially when the de Chastelain Commission was of the view that it could fulfil its mandate and its Second Report. I am surprised that Mr Bruton is happy to set aside their independent judgement and substitute his own. The Taoiseach has been absolutely firm and unambiguous on the fundamental principles of democracy, and it is quite wrong to insinuate otherwise. In the light of the second de Chastelain report, it would have been entirely reasonable to seek a delay in suspension, which Mr Bruton, as a trained lawyer, should know, is not provided for under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement, while a review was conducted. Each party to the Agreement has its own responsibilities and decisions to take, and the Irish Government has gone to great lengths to understand and where possible reconcile the difficulties not just of Mr Trimble and his party but of all the parties to the Agreement.
Mr Bruton will know from his own experience as Taoiseach all the difficulties inherent in the arms issue. In parallel with Sir Patrick Mayhew's Washington 3 demands of March 1995, he sought a gesture which he was still waiting for when he left office, two and a quarter years later, the IRA ceasefire having broken down partly consequent on the prolonged impasse thereby created. Without disparaging some of the progress made in his time, the whole situation has moved on a great deal since, thanks in part to the wise and prudent leadership given by the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, who has established good working relations with practically all parties. Mr Bruton should be careful about trying to make progress more difficult in Northern Ireland and he would be well advised to stop listening to siren voices that want only to exclude and excoriate a movement engaged on the difficult, dangerous and not yet completed path to peace, because of its past.
If I might also take the opportunity to respond to the comments of Kevin Myers, writing in the same issue. As far as de Valera and the mainstream antiTreaty Republicans of his time were concerned, the war was indeed over in 1923. They went on three years later to form Fianna Fail. The counter-examples he cites were the actions in effect of a small dissident rump. De Valera strongly condemned the murder of Kevin O'Higgins in 1927 as a "crime that cuts at the root of representative government". As Mr Myers must know, there would have been no civil war but for the unreasonable and morally indefensible demands of British imperialism in continuing to deny, under threat of war, the Irish people the right to whatever form of government they chose, according to the principle of consent, even in the 26 counties, particularly when the compromise of external association was on offer - Yours, etc.,
Michael O'Kennedy, TD, SC, Co-Chairman, BritishIrish Inter-Parliamentary Body, Donnybrook, Dublin 4.