BELFAST (AFP) - Warning that he would not be "bluffed," Protestant leader Ian Paisley said the latest attempt to achieve piece in Northern Ireland was doomed unless the Catholic paramilitary IRA took immediate and verifiable steps to disarm.
The 78-year-old firebrand said he was amazed to learn that only five days before the deadline for replies to an Anglo-Irish peace proposal, the IRA still has not discussed the question of disarmament with Canadian General John de Chastelain, who is charged with overseeing the disarmament process.
"This process is being held back by the Republican movement," charged Paisley, whose hardline Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) insists that the decommissioning of the Irish Republican Army is the last obstacle to a secure peace.
"They must meet immediately with de Chastelain or we will know that the whole exercice was one of deception by Sinn Fein-IRA," Paisley...
Dr. Ian R. K. Paisley | 3/18/2009
