NORTHERN IRELAND’S peace process, which has for more than a year been stumbling uncertainly along, was dealt a destabilising blow on August 26th when a unionist party signalled its imminent withdrawal from the region’s power-sharing executive. The Ulster Unionist Party announced that it intended to pull out of office following a gangland murder in Belfast. Should other parties follow, Northern Ireland’s fragile devolved government could collapse.
The trigger for the upset was the backstreets killing on August 12th of Kevin McGuigan, a former member of the IRA, which disarmed in 2005. Police say that members of the IRA were involved in the murder, though there is no evidence the killing was sanctioned at senior levels. George Hamilton, Northern Ireland’s chief policeman, said the IRA remained in existence, but that it had radically changed: “It is our assessment that [the IRA] is committed to following a political path and is no longer engaged in terrorism,” he said.
Nonetheless, the Ulster Unionists’ leader, Mike Nesbitt, said the confirmation that the IRA was still around had shattered his party’s trust in Sinn Fein, the one-time political wing of the IRA with whom it now shares office.
The Ulster Unionists’ proposed exit presents a serious test for the administration, which for nearly a year has been bogged down in disagreement...Continue reading
via Brian Rushton, The consequences of a killing
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