Irish Protestant and Catholic Leaders in Talks

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"The leader of Northern Ireland’s largest Protestant political party held formal talks today for the first time with the head of the province’s Roman Catholic Church. Even more unusual than the meeting itself, perhaps, was that both sides seemed cheerful, almost optimistic, afterward.

“It was a very helpful and constructive meeting,” the Catholic leader, Dr. Seán Brady, the Archbishop of Armagh, said in a statement. The talks, he added, “confirmed to me that all of us have a part to play in creating a more stable and prosperous future for Northern Ireland.” He called on all sides to “find the courage to take account of the needs of the other and not just those of our own community.”

At the same time, the Rev. Ian Paisley, the hard-line preacher who leads the Democratic Unionist Party, Northern Ireland’s largest Protestant party, said in a statement after the meeting that “we had a very good and useful exchange of views across a range of issues.” The subjects he and members of his party discussed with the archbishop and a delegation from the Northern Ireland Catholic Council on Social Affairs, Mr. Paisley said, included poverty, the economy, and the benefits of stable self-government in the province."

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"The timing is particularly significant. On Thursday, the prime ministers of Great Britain and Ireland are to meet with the leaders of the largest Catholic and Protestant political parties in Northern Ireland in talks aimed at restoring self-government to the province. One of the great stumbling blocks until now has been the refusal of Mr. Paisley to meet with Sinn Fein, the political arm of the Irish Republican Army and the province’s largest Catholic party."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/09/world/europe/10irishcnd.html?hp&ex=1160452800&en=84114158338946e2&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Real he-men like George W. Bush take action baby! They don't do none of this namby-pamby "talking" crap. They let their armaments do their talking for them, and devil take the hindmost. See how well that strategy has worked in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and North Korea? Successes of bellicosity, every one!

...then they could treat each other like Christians.

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"After three days of closed-door negotiations, Britain and Ireland today offered a compromise formula to restore Northern Ireland’s power-sharing government by next March, allowing for an election or referendum to endorse the pact. While the package was not immediately embraced by the province’s fractious political parties, it gave them until Nov. 10 to hold meetings among their followers and then give their answer to what was called the St Andrews Agreement. But it was not certain that an accord sponsored by London and Dublin would be enough to survive the tripwires of Northern Ireland’s fissured politics in Belfast.

Both the main parties — the Roman Catholic Sinn Fein and the Protestant Democratic Unionist Party — promised, however, to give a full response by the deadline date. If they consent, their action would trigger a choreographed sequence of events to permit the power-sharing government set up under the 1998 Good Friday agreement to be restored. It was suspended four years ago in a dispute over alleged espionage by the Irish Republican Army.

Restoration of the power-sharing executive would be an important step towards ending Northern Ireland’s anomalous political status at a time when its people have become accustomed to relative peace and economic benefit.

At a news conference, Prime Ministers Tony Blair of Britain and Bertie Ahern of Ireland refrained from high-flown language to herald the end of negotiations. ‘‘I think we have a way forward here,” Mr. Blair told a news conference in the glitzy golf resort hotel where the talks took place."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/13/world/europe/13cnd-irish.html?hp&ex=1160798400&en=de3460c9bd74db7a&ei=5094&partner=homepage