Loyalist leaders in the North have demanded a tough security response to recent violence from republican splinter groups and called on the IRA to declare that "the war is over" to save the Belfast Agreement.
A delegation from the Ulster Democratic Party (UDP), which is linked to the UDA/UFF, met the Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, yesterday to raise concerns over recent republican violence, including the bombing of Banbridge at the weekend. The splinter group calling itself the "real IRA" claimed responsibility for the car-bomb.
The UDP leader, Mr Gary McMichael, said he had told Dr Mowlam that a quick and strong security response was needed "to root these people out of society before they become a more potent threat than they already are". He added: "If they are allowed the room to operate, if they are allowed the oxygen they need to breathe, then they are going to grow."
Mr David Ervine of the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP), which is linked to the UVF, said he wanted a declaration by the IRA that the war was over. "It is my belief that if the IRA does not say the war is over, then the agreement is over. It is as simple as that."
The PUP Assembly member called on the Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, to make such a declaration, and said nationalists were "sitting on their hands" while unionists had difficulties.
Mr Ervine said that in a situation where people were stepping forward on a new venture, each side needed to give those on the other side "the belief that they are real". He said this was necessary if the assembly was to survive.
"The unionist populace not only do not believe that the Provos are not real, but tragically also believe that the Provos are complicit in the violence of recent days," Mr Ervine said on BBC Radio Ulster.
The loyalist paramilitaries, he said, did not share that view, but were "beginning to look in the direction of complicity by the Provos". He said unionists were mindful that the alternative to the agreement, "which is almost a joint rule between Ahern and Blair", would be more suitable to nationalism than unionism.
After her meeting with the UDP delegation, Dr Mowlam said splinter groups on both sides of the political divide were very clearly out to wreck the peace process. She said it was no coincidence that much of the recent violence had been carried out in the constituency of the First Minister of the Assembly and Ulster Unionist leader, Mr David Trimble.
She said she believed the security forces were doing a good job but that splinter groups were more problematic. "It is very, very difficult for the security forces when the splinter groups that we have operating now are smaller and less structured."
It was even more difficult to deal with punishment beatings without the support of local communities, she said.
Dr Mowlam said she believed there was tension and fear in both communities. "It will continue with a lack of confidence on both sides until we can get back into the talks process, and get that process up again and running and working."
Mr McMichael said he believed people in loyalist areas were looking to the security forces to see what their reaction was going to be to republican violence. He said later on BBC Radio that it was inconceivable that loyalist paramilitaries could decommission weapons while this threat of republican violence remained.
Mr Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein accused the loyalist leaders of hypocrisy and said there would have been no peace process if it had not been for the risks taken by his party.