Trimble: Agreement may fail

Agreement template for devolution and powersharing

Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble has said the Good Friday Agreement, on which Northern Ireland devolution is based, may ultimately prove unworkable.

In an interview for BBC News 24's Hardtalk programme, he said a lack of progress on the issue of illegally held paramilitary arms could result in the Agreement having to be reviewed in the autumn.

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Click here to watch the full interview

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The Ulster Unionist leader resigned as Northern Ireland first minister on 1 July because the IRA had not started to disarm.

He has made it clear he will not return to the joint office held with the SDLP acting deputy first minister Seamus Mallon unless decommissioning starts.

David Trimble: Alternatives to Agreement may have to be considered

The British and Irish Governments are drawing up a package of proposals for a settlement between the pro-Agreement parties on the issues of arms, policing, demilitarisation and the stability of the political institutions.

They intend to present the "non-negotiable" document to the parties next week following five days of intensive talks brokered by Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Irish counterpart Bertie Ahern, at Weston Park in Staffordshire last week.

However, Mr Trimble said he might have to accept that the 1998 peace accord - the template for Northern Ireland devolution - which he signed up to with most of Northern Ireland's other political parties, could not be implemented.

He said: "My primary objective is to see this agreement implemented and fully implemented and that is the sole reason behind what I have been doing for the last few months.

"But there are obviously other possibilities in the situation, if it turns out that we can't implement it fully because the paramilitaries won't abide by their own obligations underneath it."

Following Mr Trimble's resignation, there was six weeks available to the parties to find a resolution by 12 August.

At the end of that period, if there has been no deal, the British Government will have to either suspend the assembly - even if only for a short period to give more room for manoeuvre - or call an assembly election.

'Policing requirements'

Meanwhile, Sinn Fein warned, after a meeting of its party ruling executive in Dublin on Saturday, that the political package must be solely based on the Agreement.

Mitchel McLaughlin: "Document must satisfy Sinn Fein on policing"

Sinn Fein chairman Mitchel McLaughlin warned the governments that Sinn Fein would not accept the document if it fell short of the Agreement, particularly on the issue of policing.

He said: "In the terms of policing, there is a very, very specific remit for an accountable and representative policing service that all can join."

Sinn Fein would issue a response to the package by 12 August, but he did not know how the IRA would respond, he added.

'Verbal assurance not enough'

However, speaking on the BBC's Inside Politics programme on Saturday, Finance Minister Mark Durkan said another verbal assurance from the IRA on decommissioning would not be enough to safeguard the future of the assembly.

Mark Durkan: "Verbal assurance on arms will not be sufficient"

The SDLP minister said there would have to be some indication of progress on the arms issue before the political institutions could be stabilised.

He said: "I don't believe that some more fine-sounding words will be enough to give us a basis for securing the full implementation of the Agreement.

"All that will mean, is that people would then say: okay we will have to test that in a month or two month's time.

"And then we would be back into the same sort of impasse that we are in.

"We can't run the Agreement on this sort of stop-go way."

In May 2000, the IRA gave a verbal assurance that it would move towards putting its weapons beyond use by the end of June 2000 as part of a deal agreed by the pro-Agreement parties during talks at Hillsborough.

However, it has so far refused to begin actual decommissioning because it says the context of full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement under which it agreed to disarm has not been achieved.

The Hardtalk interview with David Trimble will be broadcast on BBC News 24 at 2230 BST on Monday.