The consequences of a killing

NORTHERN IRELAND’S peace process, which has for more than a year been stumbling uncertainly along, was dealt a destabilising blow on August 26th when a unionist party signalled its imminent withdrawal from the region’s power-sharing executive. The Ulster Unionist Party announced that it intended to pull out of office following a gangland murder in Belfast. Should other parties follow, Northern Ireland’s fragile devolved government could collapse.

The trigger for the upset was the backstreets killing on August 12th of Kevin McGuigan, a former member of the IRA, which disarmed in 2005. Police say that members of the IRA were involved in the murder, though there is no evidence the killing was sanctioned at senior levels. George Hamilton, Northern Ireland’s chief policeman, said the IRA remained in existence, but that it had radically changed: “It is our assessment that [the IRA] is committed to following a political path and is no longer engaged in terrorism,” he said.

Nonetheless, the Ulster Unionists’ leader, Mike Nesbitt, said the confirmation that the IRA was still around had shattered his party’s trust in Sinn Fein, the one-time political wing of the IRA with whom it now shares office.

The Ulster Unionists’ proposed exit presents a serious test for the administration, which for nearly a year has been bogged down in disagreement over welfare reform. Relations between the two parties which dominate the executive, Sinn Fein and the Democratic Unionists, have degenerated into ill-tempered public spats.

Many locals see the power-sharing government as an inefficient talking-shop for overpaid politicians. But its collapse would cause alarm in London and Dublin, where both national governments invested decades of effort in constructing an assembly which they hoped would underpin the peace process with political foundations.

Theresa Villiers, Britain’s secretary for Northern Ireland, attempted to play down the continued existence of the IRA. “There is no evidence it’s involved in terrorism or paramilitary activity,” she said, following the murder. Although most would like the IRA to disband completely rather than lurk in the wings, the judicious application of constructive ambiguity has helped to keep the peace process afloat.

The Ulster Unionists lack the power to bring down Northern Ireland’s government on their own, since they head just one of its 13 departments. But their walkout will put pressure on the Democratic Unionists, the largest party in the government, to follow suit.

Peter Robinson, the Democratic Unionists’ leader and Northern Ireland’s first minister, will seek to regain the political initiative by stressing that he too is concerned about the IRA’s continued existence, though the police believe it represents little threat to the peace process.

A complicating factor is that the two unionist parties, which have been bitter rivals for decades, will be contesting elections in May next year. This led Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein, a former IRA commander who is now Mr Robinson’s deputy first minister, to claim that the Ulster Unionists’ walkout was “more about inter-unionist rivalry than...feigned concern about our unequivocal commitment to peace”. Whatever the motivation for the Ulster Unionists’ exit, politicians in London and Dublin will be anxious to persuade other parties not to follow them out of the door.