Guarantees may be sticking point in crucial Ulster talks

The question of how to guarantee that all elements honour a far-reaching new agreement may be the most difficult aspect of talks hosted in Northern Ireland today by Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern, the Taoiseach.

While progress has been made on a number of fronts during intensive negotiations in recent days, the issue of whether to build in sanctions against anyone defaulting on a new deal has taken centrestage.

Progress has been made in important areas such as policing, criminal justice and dealing with republicans who have been "on the run" for many years.

But Sinn Fein is expected to press for an acceleration of a plan to demilitarise Northern Ireland by reducing the number of security bases and outposts, particularly in border areas, as well as troop levels.

The British and Irish governments have drawn up a draft joint declaration setting out plans for "acts of completion" in these and other fields. Points in the declaration might be changed during today's negotiation.

If the main Northern Ireland parties can agree on the declaration by tonight it will be seen as a breakthrough in the peace process. If not, further talks will go on as the governments work towards holding Assembly elections in May.

An agreed declaration will pave the way for an important move from what one participant in the negotiations called "the empty seat at the table". This was a reference to the IRA, which will be expected to provide its own act of completion.

The two governments are united in stipulating that this should involve not only further acts of arms decommissioning but also promises that the IRA will cease activities such as targeting, intelligence-gathering and "punishment" attacks. London and Dublin have spelt out what is required from the IRA but both governments remain in the dark on exactly what the organisation might do or how it would do it.

The realpolitik is that an IRA move would have to be on a major scale if the organisation is to convince Protestant and Unionist opinion that returning to government alongside Sinn Fein would be safe.

At the weekend, David Trimble, the Ulster Unionist leader, called for "proper open decommissioning" and insisted that on-the-run republicans should not be granted an amnesty. It appears that the latter point can be dealt with without resort to a formal amnesty.

Unionists appear to favour the filming of IRA weapons destruction, while the speculation is that republicans would prefer having credible witnesses present at any such act.

Sinn Fein is resisting the introduction of sanctions against defaulters in any new deal, apparently suspecting that this represents a Unionist ruse aimed at having Sinn Fein expelled from government if the IRA does something wrong.

Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein's chief negotiator, said yesterday: "Any move to introduce sanctions will be resisted by us. Under no circumstances will Sinn Fein accept the rights of our electorate being diluted or denied."

Mr Trimble appeared relaxed on the question of demilitarisation yesterday, saying: "Normalisation is not a problem. Reduction of troop levels is part of normalisation and if we had normality of course we'd be quite happy to see that happening," he told the BBC.

Paul Murphy, the Northern Ireland Secretary, said there was "everything to play for" in the talks. He said the aim was a cessation of paramilitary activity in all its forms.