The Ulster Unionist Party appears to have learned a lesson in public relations from the mistake of its flirtation with abstention from Stormont in July. The attempt, in his Omagh speech earlier this week, by Northern Ireland's first minister, Mr David Trimble, to engage the stalled peace process in gear once more is a welcome development; the language in which it was couched has shown a willingness to take opposition sensitivities into account. Mr Trimble's restatement of willingness to "jump together" with Sinn Fein on the issues of decommissioning and the formation of an executive, his praise for the Republic's economic performance - unthinkable for a unionist leader in the past - and his overture to Mr Seamus Mallon to reconsider his resignation as deputy first minister, will have struck a sympathetic note with many moderate nationalists on both sides of the border.
Coming, as it did, immediately after Mr Ken Maginnis's weekend statement in which he said he wanted Sinn Fein in next month's review of the Belfast Agreement even if it is shown that the IRA has broken its ceasefire, the speech has helped to enhance the party's image as genuinely seeking accommodation. The UUP now looks more reasonable than it did when choosing Glengall Street over the elected Assembly as the venue to announce its decision not to nominate ministers to the executive.
Mr Maginnis in an interview with this newspaper today makes it clear that he remains firmly committed to IRA disarmament before any executive can be set up. He states, however, that a commitment to decommissioning by the IRA would be sufficient to allow Sinn Fein into a new executive. His stance has been seen as a necessary tactic to get Sinn Fein involved in the review process. It has, however, drawn the fire not only of his more hardline party colleagues but even of some who have supported the Belfast Agreement. His emphasis in the interview that "what London, Brussels and Washington think, does matter" displays a pragmatism absent in those who have placed the party's leadership under attack.
The climate created by the IRA's murders, of which the killing of Mr Charles Bennett is but the latest, the foiled attempt by republicans to smuggle arms from Florida and the IRA mind-set which feels justified in killing suspected informers, raising funds through robbery, augmenting its arsenal and maiming petty criminals, have hardly been conducive to unionist tolerance. In this context Mr Maginnis has shown courage and imagination. In comparison Sinn Fein's claims that the UUP has been simply attempting to re-write the Belfast Agreement look lame as the parties jockey for position in the lead-up to Senator George Mitchell's review.
The Government's image has not been enhanced either. The premature statement by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Andrews, that a conclusion had been reached that the ceasefire was intact was embarrassing to both sovereign governments. It drew an immediate denial from Dr Mowlam. It also gave Mr John Taylor the opportunity to go off on a tangent and suggest that the Mitchell review was now "in total disarray". In the circumstances, Mr Trimble's suggestion yesterday that Mr Andrews's mind had not been "in gear" when he made the remark appears charitable rather than flippant.