Gerry Adams' Response to Blair

["D OC" <donaloc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

SPEECH GIVEN BY SINN FÉIN PRESIDENT GERRY ADAMS AT THE HILLGROVE HOTEL,
MONAGHAN
IN RESPONSE TO SPEECH BY BRITISH PRIME MINISTER TONY BLAIR IN BELFAST 10
DAYS AGO
Today's meeting, "Working together for a New Ireland", is the inaugural
conference of Sinn Fein elected representatives throughout this entire
island.
[As this is a very long speech, I have snipped a large chunk at this
stage]...
Mr. Blair's speech last week, understandably, was portrayed in the media as
no more than a call for the IRA to disband. He is bound to understand why
that has angered republicans. But it was a serious and detailed speech and I
said at the time that it deserved a considered response. And having looked
at it carefully I do see some positive elements.
Mr. Blair recognised that Catholics had been treated in the north as second
class citizens. I agree.
He said that the overwhelming majority of people want the institutions to
remain in place. I agree.
He said that the time for transition had come to an end. There was a need
for acts of completion. I agree.
He said that the British government thought the Good Friday Agreement should
be implemented in one fell swoop, instead of a concession to one side here
and a concession to the other there. I agree.
Sinn Fein has long called for the Agreement to be implemented in full. It is
high time the British government implemented the Agreement in all its
aspects.
In reality this means acts of completion on;
* The Political institutions
* Justice
* Human Rights
* Equality
* Demilitarisation,
* Victims
* Policing
* OTRs [On the Runs]
Above all else it means dealing with these matters as political issues,
instead of security problems.
It means embarking on a process of irreversible change.
I want to make a few specific remarks on the issue of policing.
At Weston Park the British government and the Irish government agreed a take
it or leave it package which included a rejection, for example, of the
request for a full independent international judicial inquiry into the
killing of Pat Finucane. Instead a stalling exercise was put forward and
last week with the cancellation once again of the Steven's Inquiry report,
we had another instalment in that effort to dodge the truth of the RUC
Special Branch and MI5's involvement in the killings of citizens on behalf
of the British state. That Special Branch and MI5 remain at the heart of the
new policing service. They are the epicentre of the political police we
agreed to remove.
At Weston Park the British, again in their take it or leave it mode,
promised amendments to policing legislation to make it more fully reflect
Patten. Remember before Weston Park we were being told that Patten was being
fully implemented. Here then was an admission that this was not the case but
instead of a commitment to implement Patten fully through amendments we had
an assertion that amendments would change legislation to 'more fully reflect
Patten'. The SDLP acquiesced to that position. That is for less than Patten
and the Good Friday Agreement commitments on policing.
The broad nationalist consensus had already been broken on this issue by the
Irish government's position. But unlike the SDLP the Irish government does
not have to defend their position to citizens most effected by the absence
of the type of policing which is required.
I think that those who acquiesced to the British position made a mistake. I
understand why they did so and why the SDLP in particular defends its
position so ferociously.
It is now attempting to claim the Weston Park proposals as a result of its
good negotiation even though these amendments fall short of what is
required. And in fact SDLP sensitivity on this issue has been quoted to me
by officials from both governments as the reason why movement cannot go as
far as is required under the Good Friday Agreement.
We are arguing for the Good Friday Agreement vision of policing to become a
reality. And that means the British government moving beyond its Weston Park
position. It also means that the Irish government and the SDLP need to
assert this as a matter of the unfinished work of the Good Friday Agreement.
An acceptable policing service is crucial for all sections of our people in
the north. It is also in the better interests of all of the people of this
island. And if power can be transferred on a range of key issues, there is
no reason why policing and justice cannot be devolved on the same basis.
So, consequently I can conceive of a world in which it would be appropriate
for Sinn Féin to join the Policing Board and participate fully in the
policing arrrangements on a democratic basis. That has to be when there is a
proper beginning to policing, as agreed in the Good Friday Agreement and as
recommended by Patten.
Nationalists and republicans also need to be convinced, as do in my view a
lot of unionists, that the toleration by British agencies of unionist
paramilitaries has ended.
I note in particular that the British Prime Minister says he will take steps
to stop the unionists wrecking the Executive and north-south institutions
again in future. How will the British government do that? How can we be sure
that the unionists will not wreck the institutions again on the basis of
some transitional demand? After all it wasn't the unionists who suspended
the institutions!
Mr. Blair's speech explicitly acknowledged that the Good Friday Agreement
has not been implemented. Let us be clear about that. Have the two
governments got a plan to implement the outstanding aspects? I certainly
have had no sight of it. But we are patient. As James Connolly once said
patience has to be one of the essential virtues for revolutionaries, all the
more so I suppose when the revolution is by democratic and peaceful means.
We are also very conscious that this is a process.
Mr. Blair says that at the core of the Agreement was this deal: in return
for equality and justice - in politics, policing, in acceptance of
nationalist identity - all parties were to commit exclusively to peace.
He then goes on to say that republicans then made the continued existence of
the IRA a leverage in negotiations. He says that this is at the heart of the
present crisis.
All the while he says we were coming to a crunch point. Would republicanism
really take the final step of committing exclusively, Sinn Féin and the IRA,
to the peaceful path?
I can understand the sense of Mr. Blair's perception about all of this but
I'm sure, if he paused to reconsider, he will see the flaw in this version
of events.
As one fo the republicans involved in all of the negotiations with the
British government I can state categorically that we never made the IRA an
issue. In fact the Agreement came some years after the IRA cessations and I
believe that the maintenance of those cessations and various initiatives by
the IRA demonstrates that organisations commitment to this process.
It also, and let us not undervalue this, created the space for all of the
opportunities that have been developed since.
Our view is and was that the IRA cessations effectively moved the Army out
of the picture and allowed the rest of us to begin an entirely new process.
Our strategy, and Mr. Blair knows this is about bringing an end to physical
force republicanism, by creating an alternative way to achieve democratic
and republican objectives.
Far from using the IRA as leverage during negotiations we sought to have the
Good Friday Agreement implemented, not only because that is our obligation,
not only because that is the right thing, but also because that fitted into
a strategy of creating an alternative to war and a means of sustaining and
anchoring the peace process.
It wasn't we who promoted the issue of arms decommissioning as a
precondition on an Agreement but it was us and others who moved so that the
IRA came to do the unthinkable. To not only work with the IICD but also to
put arms beyond use under its auspices at a time when unionist
paramilitaries were on a killing spree, when orange marches were being
forced into Catholic neighbourhoods and when the British Army was
remilitarising.
It wasn't we who came up with another demand once progress on the arms issue
was being made.
I do not pretend to speak for the Army on these matters but I do believe
that they are serious about their support for a genuine peace process.
They have said so. I believe them.
I speak for this party and we are completely committed to peaceful and
democratic means.
We are about making peace.
About working with others to make this a reality for everyone.
There is no other way forward.
As an Irish republican, as a citizen of Ireland, I want to see an end to
British rule in this country yesterday.
I want to see every British soldier out of this country by five o'clock this
evening. But I am realistic enough to know that this is unlikely, for today
anyway. But it will happen. And I will continue to work, and this party will
continue to work towards these objectives until they are a reality.
Because I know it will be achieved through a process. Not by way of
ultimatiums from me or any other Irish person.
Similarly the IRA is never going to disband in response to ultimatiums from
the British government, or David Trimble.
But I do believe the logic of the peace process, puts all of us in a
different place.
I want to see an end to all of the armed groups on this island. That has to
be the aim of every thinking republican.
So if you ask me do I envisage a future without the IRA? The answer is
obvious.
The answer is Yes.
And who can influence the IRA most?
The British government - the unionists - the Irish government and us as well
of course.
All of us have to make politics work.
All of us have to strive to bring closure to all of these issues in ways
which are realistic and achievable.
All of us have to make peace, to build justice.
While I believe that the majority of unionists want to embrace change it is
clear that their political leaders do not want the Good Friday Agreement to
be implemented.
Dr. Paisley has always been clear about this.
So too is the Ulster Unionist Party's current position. It appears that the
demands of unionism are insatiable. They are also not deliverable.
Not unless the two governments tear up the Good Friday Agreement.
Not unless nationalists and republicans in the north decide to accept less
than our very basic entitlements.
But part of the problem for those of us who have to manage this process is
that Irish republicanism is seen by the British establishment and its
system, quite correctly, as being against its long term interests. This is
because it interprets these interests in a very narrow and short sighted
way.
It sees unionism as an ally, even with all its imperfections.
So the challenge for Mr. Blair in all of this is quite profound. He has made
a singular and exceptional contribution to this process.
He understands as well as I do that it is a process and that all of us
needto apply ourselves and see beyond the difficulties of the moment.
Mr. Blair I believe should see Britain's strategic interest being best
served by the democratic resolution of the long standing quarrel betwene the
people of these two islands.
His task in the short term has to be to continue the process of peacemaking.
The Good Friday Agreement remains the only show in town.
This party doesn't need to be told that. But the unionists do. So to does
the British system.
This is not a perfect process. By its very nature it has involved
compromise. It need collectivity.
Many may argue that it is indeed an imperfect peace. But let's be realistic
about this, it is a lot better than what is happening in other parts of the
world at this time and it?s a lot better than what was happening in this
country over a long time.
So the challenge for Mr. Blair is to shape his own system, his own agencies,
to make this process work, and in so doing to accept that the leaderships of
political unionism will not journey along the Good Friday Agreement process
if they can avoid that.
But like people everywhere they will respond to the conditions in which they
live and I retain a confidence that if unionism is liberated, like the rest
of us, from the conditions of the past they will rise to the challenge.
There can be no escape from the reality that the conditions in which we will
all have to live are those contained in the Good Friday Agreement.
Until the unionists know that for a certainty they will resist that
Agreement.
This is a hugely traumatic process for unionism. In their hearts they know
that the game is up.
It isn't over. But it is up. And whether the majority of unionists ever had
any real advantage from the old agenda depends on how you define the word
advantage.
For our part let me reassert once more that never again will any of us
accept that anyone on this island can be treated except on the basis of
equality. The days of second class citizens are over.
Let me make it clear also that Irish republicans will never ever treat
unionists the way the British government and the old unionist regime treated
us.
There are undoubtedly going to be more talks in the time ahead.
By Mr. Blair's own admission his government, thus far, has not implemented
what it is obliged to implement.
In the last few years, on a number of times, when it faced the hard choice
of offending unionism it backed down. It knows this.
It is the government with the largest majority in the history of the British
Labour Party. How on earth can it expect us to persuade others of its good
intentions if it fails to do what Mr. Blair has said is the right thing?
So any further talks must be about implementing the Good Friday Agreement
not renegotiating it.
So I agree with Mr. Blair that we should aim for a just peace. That the same
standards should apply to all.
Like him I accept that trust is always in short supply in politics and in
our situation even more so.
Like him I don't exaggerate this issue. I know that we have to build decent
working relations, make the Agreement work and build trust on that basis.
This party is determined and committed to do our best to rebuild the
political process and to keep the peace process intact.
No one ever said that this was going to be easy but it is the single most
important thing that any of us can do at this time in our history.

[For full speech, visit Sinn Féin website and look for 'Speech by Gerry
Adams at Hillgrove Hotel, Monaghan' at: http://www.sinnfein.ie/index.html ]


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