The Taoiseach Enda Kenny has expressed confidence that a political deal can be achieved this week as the British and Irish governments and the North’s five main parties work to sign off on an updated Stormont House Agreement.
Mr Kenny, speaking in Enniskillen yesterday, said a blueprint agreement had been written but it needed some final touches. Senior sources said a deal could be done on Thursday.
The Taoiseach is meeting British prime minister David Cameron in Downing Street today and arrangements are being made for him to meet First Minister Peter Robinson and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness to try to resolve any outstanding issues before a deal can be concluded.
Mr Robinson and Mr McGuinness also held private talks with Mr Cameron in Downing Street on Friday as Dublin and London and the five main parties – the DUP, Sinn Féin, the SDLP, the Ulster Unionist Party and Alliance – seek to restore stability to the Northern Executive and Assembly.
“I am very hopeful that a deal is on here and I hope that it can be concluded in the next couple of days,” said Mr Kenny.
‘Concluding phase’
Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams also said the talks were “entering a concluding phase”. Mr Adams, speaking in Toronto in Canada, said there was an “onus on the British government to tackle the financial crisis it has created in the North and honour its commitments on dealing with the legacy of the past”.
The Stormont House Agreement of last Christmas was stalled because of subsequent Sinn Féin and SDLP opposition to the welfare reform element.
The murder of Belfast republican Kevin McGuigan in August and the PSNI assessment that some IRA members were involved, triggered a crisis over the issue of the continued existence of the IRA and of paramilitarism in general.
Mr Kenny said in recent weeks progress was made on all fronts. “Of course it is never signed until everybody has agreed fully and I hope that can happen this week,” he said.
One new initiative under discussion is a possible arrangement to tackle cross-Border crime and paramilitarism. Mr Kenny said if a request for such an arrangement were to emerge that the Government “will be very supportive”.
DUP Minister for Finance Arlene Foster said that initiative was necessary especially in the wake of the incident in south Armagh on Friday when a PSNI officer was struck by a lorry.
Mr Kenny said there already was good co-operation in terms of tackling tobacco smuggling and fuel laundering. He said the Government “would be very happy to support as far as we can” the creation “of another council or authority” to tackle cross-Border crime.
“We can’t have paramilitarism or criminality causing all the difficulties they have caused and poisoning the social system. We would like to be able to deal with that as part of these talks,” he said.
Laurel wreath
Mr Kenny joined politicians such as Ms Foster and Ulster Unionist Party MP Tom Elliott to lay a laurel wreath among the red poppy wreaths at the war memorial in Enniskillen.
He was remembering both the dead of the first World War and the 12 people who died as a result of an IRA no-warning bomb at the war memorial in the Co Fermanagh town on Remembrance Sunday in 1987.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan joined First Minister Peter Robinson and Northern Secretary Theresa Villiers to lay a laurel wreath at the cenotaph in Belfast.
