Madam, - While your Editorial in Thursday's edition is of course right in calling for an end to republican paramilitarism (and unionist sectarianism), it is odd that neither the Irish nor the British governments - particularly the former - have reflected on what this has historically entailed in Ireland.
There has never been a case in the past century where Sinn Féin simply morphed into a democratic party. Cumann na nGaedhael emerged in 1923 from the republican post-Treaty split that brought the Civil War, aiming to found a new democratic state. Fianna Fáil was established by de Valera in 1926 after it had become clear he would have to divide from irreconcilable Sinn Féin and IRA confrères to engage with the new dispensation.
More recently, Democratic Left was able to join the 1990s Rainbow Coalition only after sloughing off the remnants of the "Official" republican movement.
There is thus no precedent for the notion that Sinn Féin would itself move from a Leninist to a liberal political style, with the IRA meanwhile withering on the vine. That is why neither the 1993 nor the 2003 joint declarations by the British and Irish governments seeking that outcome have turned the trick.
In terms of republican theology, the Army Council of the IRA, including, as it does, leading Sinn Féin members, still arrogates to itself sovereignty over all Ireland.
As an Irish citizen, I expect a more robust defence from the Taoiseach of the actual democratic Constitution of the State, notably Article 15(6): "The right to raise and maintain military or armed forces is vested exclusively in the Oireachtas. No military or armed force, other than a military or armed force raised and maintained by the Oireachtas, shall be raised or maintained for any purpose whatsoever." - Yours, etc.,
ROBIN WILSON,
Myrtlefield Park,
Belfast 9.