The report of the International Body on Arms Decommissioning recommended that participants in all-party negotiations - seeking "an agreed political settlement and to take the gun out of Irish politics" - should affirm their commitment to the following six principles: (a) To democratic and exclusively peaceful means of resolving political issues;
(b) To the total disarmament of all paramilitary organisations;
(c) To agree that such disarmament must be verifiable to the satisfaction of an independent commission;
(d) To renounce for themselves, and to oppose any effort by others, to use force, or threaten to use force, to influence the course or the outcome of all-party negotiations;
(e) To agree to abide by the terms of any agreement reached in all-party negotiations and to resort to democratic and exclusively peaceful methods in trying to alter any aspect of that outcome with which they may disagree;
(f) To urge that "punishment" killings and beatings stop, and to take effective steps to prevent such actions.