The fragility of Northern Ireland's peace

It might seem to outsiders that Northern Ireland's tentative experiment with power-sharing is always hanging by a thread; permanently on the brink of the abyss.

And there is some truth in that perception.

But this time, let there be no mistake, the thread is thinner, the abyss a little deeper and darker.

The power-sharing arrangements between Unionists and Nationalists which grew out of the paramilitary ceasefires and the Good Friday Agreement have never seemed more fragile.

The whole edifice was built on a tiny amount of mutual trust established between traditional enemies during years of negotiation.

Now that supply of trust is dwindling away at an alarming rate.

At the heart of the process is an interlocking series of ambiguities which are at the same time its strength and its weakness.

Republicans for example believe they are in government and in the assembly as a matter of right - exercising political power because a growing proportion of the Catholic Community in Northern Ireland votes for Sinn Fein.

Unionists believe republicans are only in office because they promised to make a transition from a past rooted in political violence into a future where they would use only democratic means.

But the republican movement is like a coin with two sides - a legitimate political arm in Sinn Fein, and a paramilitary wing, the IRA.

'Last straw'

Allowing key republicans to play important roles in both wings of the organisation made it possible for the peace process to be built on the paramilitary ceasefires... in others those dual identities served a purpose.

The last year has brought what unionists see as increasing evidence that the IRA remains active.

The arrest of three republicans in Colombia and the break-in at Castlereagh had already undermined unionist confidence; news that a senior Sinn Fein official has been charged with possessing information likely to be of use to terrorists in a sense is the last straw.

Frustratingly for their opponents, republicans tend to avoid dealing with the substance of any of these charges and to portray themselves as victims of a sinister conspiracy by elements within the British security system.

Centuries of enmity

The Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams also makes the perfectly valid point that to some extent the reaction of the two unionist parties is shaped by the fact that they are preparing to compete for the votes of a protestant electorate that is increasingly sceptical about power-sharing.

But there's no doubt that unionists are genuinely angry and they want the British Government to throw Sinn Fein out of the Northern Ireland executive.

The British Government though is reluctant, and while Tony Blair meets all the key players in the coming days, his instinct plainly is to attempt to keep the whole increasingly unhappy show on the road.

In part, that is because when you look back on this period of Irish politics historically, it will be remembered as the moment when the British Government began a dialogue with the movement behind Irish political violence after centuries of enmity.

No individual politician will throw that away lightly.

But the main reason is more straightforward.

If power-sharing and devolution collapse or are suspended this week, the only alternative is direct rule from Westminster to be wielded for the moment by John Reid, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

They are the only two systems of government available and in any period of direct rule the whole focus of political activity will be on getting power-sharing going again - whether that task takes weeks or years.

So there is no doubt that Northern Ireland's political institutions face their gravest moment of crisis.

But even now the parties are still talking, and even if things go horribly wrong there's reason to believe that the question will be when, rather than whether, they can be put back together.

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