Sinn Fein votes to support police

[muriel_volestrangler]

Sinn Fein members have voted to support policing in Northern Ireland for the first time in the party's history.

About 900 party members voted on the motion at a special party conference (ard fheis) attended by about 2,000 people held in Dublin.

Sinn Fein support for policing and DUP commitment to power-sharing are seen as essential to restoring NI devolution.

A six hour debate was cut short as the leadership forced a vote which was carried with almost unanimous support.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6308175.stm

This is important - Paisley's DUP doesn't have a good reason left for refusing to go in to government with Sinn Fein now. I hope Blair (because this is one area where he has succeeded in the past) can get Paisley to see sense.

[JerseygirlCT]

1. Me too.

Seems all the work has been from the Sinn Fein side. Time for Paisley's nut jobs to be forced into civility.

[Kagemusha]

2. Big symbolic, political step.

I agree with the other posters. Time for Paisley's faction to get into line. Support for the rule of law has been proclaimed - what the hell's left to wait for?

[struggle4progress]

3. Sinn Fein votes to back Northern Ireland police (IHT)

Sinn Fein endorses cooperation with force, a longtime foe
By Eamon Quinn
Published: January 28, 2007

DUBLIN: Sinn Fein, the main Catholic party in Northern Ireland, formally voted at a huge gathering Sunday to end decades of opposition to the police in the divided province, a move that Britain and Ireland see as a major step toward restoring a local government of Protestants and Catholics within weeks.

At a convention of more than 2,500 delegates and supporters here, the Sinn Fein leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness won the support of an overwhelming majority of their party to endorse cooperating with a Protestant-dominated police force that had historically worked with British soldiers to maintain British rule in the province.

The vote will have historic resonance for Irish republicans, who have viewed the police, courts and prisons in Northern Ireland as institutions of British rule since 1922. Sinn Fein allies, the Irish Republican Army, fought the Northern Ireland police in a military campaign to unite Ireland until the Good Friday peace accord of 1998 ...

Under the British-Irish plan, called the St. Andrews Agreement, Sinn Fein endorsement for policing in Northern Ireland was interlocked with the Democratic Unionist support for sharing power with republicans before some powers could be devolved from London to a local executive for the province in Belfast. The plan proposed new elections for March 7 to a Belfast assembly and the establishment of a Protestant-Catholic executive for the province on March 26 ...

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/28/news/irish.php

[Scurrilous]

4. Good news.

:thumbsup:

[LeftishBrit]

5. Good news!

And I hope that Paisley will be pushed into behaving himself (well, actually I hope that he takes a long walk on a short pier).