July 1, 1999. Copyright 1999. Graphic News. All rights reserved.

THE IRAÕS INTERNAL PRESSURES

LONDON, July 1, Graphic News: ÒTAKING THE GUN out of Irish politicsÓ has long been a slogan of peacemakers in Northern Ireland and again, at the eleventh hour, guns remain at the heart of the political wrangling to save the Good Friday peace accord.
British and Irish Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern and President Clinton have all exerted pressure on Republican and Unionist leaders to take the greatest political risks of their careers.
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams and his chief lieutenant Martin McGuinness, the partyÕs contact man on a decommissioning body led by Canadian General John de Chastelain, must deliver a total Irish Republican Army (IRA) disarmament by May 2000. Meanwhile David Trimble, Protestant leader of the province, and the Ulster Unionists must back AdamsÕ commitment in order to break the arms deadlock.
But Sinn Fein is also under heavy internal pressure. If it pushes for disarmament too soon, republicans say, the IRA could rip apart.
The last split spawned the breakaway Real IRA (RIRA) which killed 29 people and injured almost 300 with a car bomb in the market town of Omagh last August. The explosion was the worst in the NorthÕs history.
The hardline RIRA came into existence to counter moves by the IRAÕs 12-person Army Executive and Sinn Fein towards the peace strategy in October 1997, after the July ceasefire.
The RIRA recruited some 30 experienced operators from IRA ranks, mainly in the Republic but also in some areas north of the Border, especially South Armagh. Total membership is estimated at about 100 compared to the IRAÕs estimated 250 ÒvolunteersÓ in the province and on the British mainland.
The IRA, or ÒProvosÓ as they are known, came into being in the 1970s civil rights disturbance that heralded the start of the three-decade conflict that became known as ÒThe TroublesÓ and which have claimed more than 3,600 lives. The IRA recruiting net spreads wide and takes in the ÒtoughÓ areas of Dublin and the smoky Irish bars of LondonÕs Irish districts such as Kilburn.
The IRAÕs massive stockpile of arms has been built up over 25 years, most of it buried in bunkers at farms in the Irish Republic.
The guns, rifles, machineguns, surface-to-air missiles, explosives and detonators were first shipped from Libya in 1972; the arms followed from the United States, the Middle East, Czechoslovakia, from SpainÕs ETA Ð even from a Norwegian Army Reserve depot near Oslo, robbed in 1984.
The consignments are hidden in carefully prepared Òarmy dumpsÓ and safe houses around the Republic. Controlled by IRA quartermasters Ð among the most powerful figures in the republican movement Ð they are located along the border for regular use by terrorists in South Armagh, Londonderry and Fermanagh and deep within the republic around Tipperary and Limerick.
The arms are handed out by the quartermasters only when the IRAÕs shadowy Army Council, the groupÕs top body, authorises an offensive.
IRA discipline is unforgiving. Wayward members, informers or opponents are beaten with baseball bats in Òpunishment beatingsÓ, shot through the knees or are just killed.
Its motto in the Irish language is ÒTiocfhaidh Ar La.Ó It means: ÒOur day will comeÓ.
/ENDS
Sources: JaneÕs Information Services, Reuters, The Dirty War by Martin Dillon