Ta An La Tagtha

Tβ an lβ tagtha. The barbaric attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington …

Tβ an lβ tagtha. The barbaric attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington in the biggest terrorist incidents in peacetime, coupled with the coalition on international terrorism being forged by President Bush throughout the world, have utterly changed the climate for Sinn FΘin and the IRA. The message in today's Irish Times/Prime Time opinion poll is unambigious on Northern Ireland: the time has come for an actual start to the decommissioning of IRA arms if the Belfast Agreement and its institutions are to be maintained.

The Taoiseach's response to yesterday's IRA statement that it will intensify its "engagement" with the Independent International Decommissioning Body with a view to accelerating progress towards the comprehensive resolution of this issue is endorsed. Promises of further talk do not go far enough.

In the wake of the attack on America, the proposal of a method to put IRA arms completely and verifiably beyond use - made and withdrawn by the IRA last August - is deemed insufficient to maintain the Agreement by a clear majority of 58 per cent of voters. Only one-third of Northern voters, 35 per cent, see the offer of such a scheme to be sufficient now, among them 12 per cent of unionists, 22 per cent of loyalists, 62 per cent of SDLP and 82 per cent of Sinn FΘin supporters.

The shift in attitudes towards terrorism and the twin-track ballot and bullet strategy is best illustrated by the finding that an overwhelming 85 per cent of Northern voters believe that the IRA should now begin the process of putting its weapons beyond use. Only 9 per cent disagree. The demand for action on decommissioning is shared by 95 per cent of unionists, 97 per cent of loyalists, 82 per cent of SDLP supporters. Sinn FΘin is fairly evenly divided on the question: 46 per cent want the process to begin; 44 per cent do not. There is a clear majority of 57 per cent of voters - 80 per cent of unionists, 55 per cent of loyalists, 38 per cent of SDLP and 14 per cent of Sinn FΘin - who hold that parties with paramilitary connections should now be excluded from the Executive if weapons are not put beyond use.

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Another measure of the new political and security landscape can be gleaned from the finding that three-quarters of voters believe that Catholics should now join the new Police Service of Northern Ireland. In the week when nominations are invited to the Policing Board, the figures offer some encouragement to the parties. Some 77 per cent of unionists, 64 per cent of loyalists, 88 per cent of SDLP and 39 per cent of Sinn FΘin supporters favour a police force with cross-community support.

The Belfast Agreement has survived through precarious days in the past. All has changed after the attack on America. The findings of today's MRBI opinion poll demonstrate that the Agreement and its institutions cannot be sustained into the future without actual decommissioning. The Republican Movement would do well to bear that message in mind. There is no possibility in the new world order of being both a friend and a foe of terrorism.