Rowan Tree and Red Thread

Going by past events there'll probably still be at least one group from within the overall movement that refuses to disarm, adopts a new [but similar] name and keeps on committing atrocities... :-(

The recent bombings may have accelerating things a little, but this statement was on the cards for a long time. Gerry Adams has been working to get the IRA Army Council round to a definitive statement to put some movement back into the Peace Process.

I'm hopeful. It's the hope of someone who has hoped before and been disappointed, however. Within hours of the release of the statement the DUP representatives (DUP = Democratic Unionist Party, the Unionist big winners of the last elections and the polarisation we saw during that campaign) were already picking holes, and looking for further commitments. As my wife Sam said last night, the DUP are past masters of saying something long and hard, refusing to budge and eventually other people come to buy their stance as founded on more than simple intransigence and inertia.

Still, this is the thing we all been waiting for from the IRA: a direct order to the 'Volunteers' to lay down their arms. Whether this will lead to splinter groups forming and bloody housekeeping within the movement we've yet to see.
If it works it is a good sign to others that the political process can be made to work, even after years of violence.