THE British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, will today be urging President Clinton to throw his full weight behind the latest attempt to reach a lasting peace settlement in Northern Ireland.
The two leaders will discuss the North on the margin of the G8 taking place here this weekend.
In New York yesterday, Mr Blair said: "A moment of decision is coming for Sinn Fein/IRA as to whether they really want to be any part of a forward process that is going to lead to a lasting settlement and peace in Northern Ireland."
He said the Lurgan murders of two RUC officers had "provoked a degree of revulsion here [in the US] as well as in Britain and in Northern Ireland and that has greatly changed the atmosphere and it is important to build on that."
Asked if he wanted Mr Clinton "to mobilise American public opinion" for him, Mr Blair said there had been "a great change" in public opinion in the US as a result of the Lurgan killings "because people know not merely were the killings wrong in themselves, but they came at the very time when people could see a new British government trying to take steps towards peace.
"And I think there is a moment of decision that is there for Sinn Fein/IRA and I think here as elsewhere, people now want to see all those in good faith take this process forward."
Mr Blair said it was important to build on the change in attitudes in the US and to say to the US people: "You know those of you who have had some attachment to Sinn Fein realise that any money that you give now ends up in policemen being killed in cold blood..."