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Britain, Ireland to Hold N.Irish Peace Summit
The British and Irish Republic prime ministers will meet in London Wednesday to push forward the Northern Ireland peace process, Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern said Sunday, January 28.
"We are not going to give up. I believe that we have made sufficient progress to believe that we should keep at this and try to find a resolution," said Ahern.
He said there is no possibility of a deal on outstanding issues such as IRA decommissioning at the meeting. But he added that he is "determined... if not optimistic" that a resolution can eventually be achieved.
A breakthrough is unlikely without progress "across all fronts, " he said.
Ahern and his British counterpart, Tony Blair, have been leading attempts to defuse tension between Protestant and Roman Catholic parties on a range of issues that have snarled the 1998
Good Friday Agreement, but no breakthrough has yet been achieved.
"We will have a summit meeting on Wednesday night in No. 10 (Downing Street)... and look at where we are at. We do not have a deal. Wednesday night will be looking at where we have got," Ahern said.
The Good Friday agreement aimed to bring an end to three decades of sectarian violence between majority Protestants who want to preserve British rule in Northern Ireland and Catholic republicans seeking union with the Irish Republic.
Major guerrilla forces are operating cease-fires but politicians are locked in rows over the disarming of Irish Republican Army militia, police reforms and demands for cuts in Britain's military presence in the province.
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