The British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, welcomed the IRA ceasefire announcement, saying he hoped it would herald a future free from violence and hatred. Speaking at his country residence, Chequers, on Saturday, he said: "This is good news. We welcome it. There are still a lot of problems still to be sorted out, but at least it gives us the chance of, and a hope for, a decent future for people in Northern Ireland, so that we don't have yet another generation of people growing up with violence and hatred and despair around them."
Asked if he could be confident that the ceasefire would hold, Mr Blair added: "The ceasefire has to be genuine and unequivocal. That is absolutely clear, it is what we said all the way through and we will have to make a judgment about that, but at least we have got the first step.
"I am so anxious to secure for the people of Northern Ireland some chance of a decent future where the politics in Northern Ireland becomes about schools and hospitals and roads, and all the rest of the things that people want to talk about, rather than the bitterness and hatred that have been there in the past."
Mr Blair was asked if he believed he could bring the unionists to the negotiating table with Sinn Fein. He replied: "I hope very much that we can keep everyone in the talks process, because the thing that has transformed the situation is that everybody accepts - and I hope that Sinn Fein will accept too - that it is the consent of the people of Northern Ireland that must be the key thing."
Asked whether he still thought all-party talks could start in September, Mr Blair said: "I am confident that we should be able to get that done. "There are still obstacles but we are making progress." The Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, said on Saturday that contacts between the British government and Sinn Fein would begin immediately after the IRA ceasefire came into force. She said officials would contact Sinn Fein to work out how contacts could take place. Dr Mowlam indicated that ministers could be sitting down with Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness within days. She was speaking on Saturday in Belfast after the ceasefire had been called but before it took effect. - She said the British government would stick to the terms of the aide-memoire, which said meetings with ministers could begin after a ceasefire. But she said she was not going to spell out whether a meeting would take place within one day, two days or three days.