Monitor

All the News of the World The Irish press on the likelihood of an end to the Northern Ireland deadlock

MORE THAN a year on from the Good Friday agreement, we have lived up to our commitments but others have not. Are the other parties to the Good Friday agreement still committed to the declarations they made in April 1998? Why are we being asked to show more commitment to the peace process when others have shown absolutely none. Why, when others are backtracking, reinterpreting and rewriting the agreement, are Sinn Fein being asked to do more and more. This was not just the message from the Sinn Fein leadership. It was the message from the vast majority of speakers at our ard fheis . The message to Trimble, Ahern, Blair and others was a simple one: "We are resolute and determined. What about you?"

An Phoblacht/Republican News, Belfast and Dublin

MORE THAN one deadline for the formation of the Northern Ireland executive has come and gone. Now Tony Blair has set July 1 as the "absolute deadline". Can this one be met? It deserves to be, if only as a reward for the ingenuity invested by the Irish and British governments in devising the latest formula. But many of Trimble's followers disbelieve in the good faith of Sinn Fein; and many nationalist voters equally distrust all unionists. Gestures from both sides are needed to inspire mutual confidence. There could hardly be a better gesture, or a fairer wind for the executive, than a compromise on the bitter issue of Drumcree.

Irish Independent, Dublin

SOONER RATHER than later, Gerry Adams and the party will have to face the old, old question: is Sinn Fein a party like others, or does it insist on maintaining a united front with an illegal organisation? So what do we do, if Tony Blair can't work the miracle? In Europe, France and Germany didn't start off with a governmental coalition, after the war. They worked up to the present level by co-operation on iron and steel production, to create trust. Maybe there's a lesson there - but, of course, the Agreement is the shining, perhaps unattainable, ideal.

(Barry White) Belfast Telegraph