Support the peace process

Thank you to all signatories of our petition from 9 May 2000 - read it below:

Move on towards peace in the North of Ireland

Conflict resolution needs democracy, justice, cooperation and confidence

We welcome the Joint Statement of the British and Irish Governments and their decision to reinstate the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement by May 22nd.

We hope that especially the British Government has learned its lesson from this deep crisis: the suspension of the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement by the British Secretary of State on February 11th has almost killed the Agreement by stalling a most vital part of a process designed to enable conflict resolution by an agreed, inclusive cooperation of all parties in the North of Ireland, based on the democratic mandate given through the people's vote.

The eight weeks that the institutions functioned demonstrated that the peace process could succeed. Devolution was working much better than anyone expected and had a strong support from people within both communities. The eight weeks allowed a glimpse into what will be possible in the future if the will and vote of Irish people is respected without side letters and interference from London. This short period was able to prove that there is indeed a way for conflict resolution because despite all party differences the mere fact of cooperation silenced the "no" camps of all sides.

It has been a sad and ironic development that the suspension of the institutions which was intended by unionists and British Government to force the IRA into decommissioning on unionist terms has encouraged the opponents to the peace process on either side and hence put violence back on the agenda while IRA guns remained silent.

The last weeks have seen increasing loyalist attacks against nationalists and republicans, ordinary members of those communities as well as republican activists. On almost a daily basis nationalists and republicans are informed that their names are found on execution lists of loyalist terror groups and that their life is in danger.

The last weeks have seen an increasing harassment of British Army and RUC against nationalist and republican areas in clear contradiction to the obligation under the Agreement of the British Government to demilitarize. In the light of these attempts of unionist no-men and British Militarists to finally bury the peace process the IRA kept its ceasefire. The IRA reached out to the Unionist community with its recent declaration in support of the Agreement. We hope that the response of the unionist community and their representatives will be a return to inclusively working together on conflict resolution.

Most of the time since signing the Good Friday Agreement has been lost by broken deadlines and stalling preconditions to block political progress. It has been characterized by the failure of the British Government to fulfill its obligations under the agreement.

We urge the British Government to honor its obligations under the Agreement to reinstate the suspended institutions, to agree and guarantee that the basis of further decisions about the future of the North of Ireland will be respect for the democratic process and the will of the voters north and south in Ireland.

We urge the British Government to implement the outstanding aspects of the Good Friday Agreement without further delay. Conflict resolution in the North of Ireland requires democracy, equality and justice for all people.

"The Joint Declaration acknowledges that the most urgent and important issue facing the people of Ireland, North and South, and the British and Irish Governments together, is to remove the causes of conflict, to overcome the legacy of history and to heal the divisions which have resulted. Joint Frameworks Document (Paragraph 1)."

The following number of good people have

visited our site, we Thank them!!

(THIS SITE IS A "NO RIGHT CLICK" ZONE)

ALL GRAPHICS, PAGES AND TEXT ARE COPYRIGHT

"FAERIE NIGHTS' WEBDESIGN AND MAY NOT BE DUPLICATED WITHOUT WRITTEN APPROVAL

OF 'FAERIE NIGHTS' OR THE

'SAVE THE GFA COALITION'