Sanctions against parties: The immediate political prospects for the North appeared bleak last night as the British government applied sanctions against Sinn Féin and the Progressive Unionist Party, and signalled the possibility of more to come.
Northern Ireland Secretary Mr Paul Murphy told MPs he would consult both parties before tabling an order next Wednesday effecting the proposed withdrawal of block financial assistance from Sinn Féin and the PUP in accordance with the recommendation of the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC).
The proposed order will also give the Secretary of State power to reduce the salaries of any members of the Stormont Assembly should he think it appropriate to do so in light of future IMC reports.
British sources stressed they had no desire to do so, and expressed the hope that both parties - directly implicated by the IMC with continuing republican and loyalist paramilitary activities - would consider themselves "on some form of probation" by the time the IMC is next scheduled to report in September.
However bitter recrimination in Belfast, and the Irish Government's reported decision to cancel next week's planned "proximity talks" in London, cast doubt over Mr Murphy's insistence that dialogue had merely been postponed and that the promised intensive drive to restore devolution could be resumed before the summer.
It is understood that the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, spoke to British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair, by telephone on Monday and offered his assessment that Sinn Féin was not prepared for any significant political movement at least before the European elections in June.
Downing Street maintains this affords both premiers a fresh window of opportunity in the second half of June and before the marching season reaches its climax.
However the immediate political fallout from the postponement of the planned talks and the IMC report found the Rev Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionist Party pressing for precisely that in the Commons yesterday. Dismissing the proposed withholding of state assistance to Sinn Féin and the PUP as "a murder tax" amounting to "no penalty at all", Dr Paisley told Mr Murphy: "What we need are proper sanctions That those who don't play by the rules can't be part of the talks."
Mr Murphy said that he hoped the IMC report, and the British government's "measured action" in response to it, would "underline that it is essential that all paramilitary activity, from whatever quarter, should cease fully and completely".
However, Mr Seamus Mallon, of the SDLP, said such "petty cash penalties" would "mean nothing" to what he described as "the richest party in western Europe".