Irish Peace Deal In Danger

British Prime Minister Tony Blair launched a new effort Tuesday to save Northern Ireland's peace agreement, emphasizing that Irish Republican Army disarmament must be "plainly part of the process."

Blair said he had returned to Northern Ireland to oversee more talks because "alarm bells are ringing." He was referring to the June 30 deadline he set to devolve powers to a still-unformed Protestant-Catholic government for the province.

"I am serious about this deadline," Blair said, noting that if the administration overseeing the government wasn't running by July 1, "we'll have to look for another way forward."

During his speech to Protestant and Catholic children from 10 schools, Blair frequently criticized those who claimed the Good Friday peace accord had changed nothing in the past 14 months.

He noted that the Ulster Unionists, the major pro-British Protestant party, now talk regularly with the IRA-linked Sinn Fein party.

And he addressed the dilemma that has prevented the government's formation--the Ulster Unionists' refusal to work with Sinn Fein until the Irish Republican Army begins disarming.

Blair noted that Sinn Fein leaders believed the arms demand was designed to bar them from government, while the Ulster Unionists were adamant that leaders of the Sinn Fein-IRA movement seemed "addicted to violence as a tactic."

But Blair emphasized that Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble "is totally sincere in trying to make this whole thing work."

Blair said the IRA's refusal to drop its blanket opposition to disarmament, even though negotiators expected it to happen by mid-2000, had raised legitimate questions for the province's Protestant majority.

"Is it because they (IRA commanders) just won't bow to unionist demands? Or is it in a more sinister way because they want to retain violence as an option?" Blair said. "It's a question that has to be answered."