The Five Demands

Martin McGuinness ha riferito alla BBC che il governo inglese ha tenuto dei colloqui con i dissidenti repubblicani nelle scorse settimane.

Dopo la chiusura del segretario di Stato alla possibilità di colloqui con le frange estreme del repubblicanesimo, McGuinness accusa il governo inglese di far buon viso a cattivo gioco.
“Possono negarlo, e non mi riguarda. Io so che ciò sta avvenendo” ha detto il numero due dello Sinn Fein, contraddicendo le parole di Owen Paterson che aveva escluso ogni coinvolgimento del governo Cameron con “chi non utilizza metodi pacifici”.
Mc Guinness ha già avuto modo di dire:” Personalmente incoraggio il dialogo. Capisco i governi che se ne escono dicendo che non è vero. Ma la realtà è che questi gruppi dissidenti, lo so per certo, sono stati coinvolti in discussioni con il governo britannico e irlandese”. Ed ancora: “Ciò mi suggerisce che questi gruppi sono consapevoli che devono svegliarsi e intuire la loro incapacità di distruggere il processo di pace”.
Owen Patterson nega nuovamente l’esistenza dei colloqui e replica: “La cooperazione a tutti i livelli tra il Regno Unito e Repubblica d’Irlanda è senza precedenti e vogliamo essere chiari, non si può avere colloqui significativi con persone che impieghino mezzi pacifici per perseguire i propri obiettivi.”

Ascolta l’intervista a Martin McGuinness

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Governments talking to dissidents: McGuinness (BBC News Northern Ireland)
Martin McGuinness Martin McGuinness said he knew talks had taken place
The British government has talked to dissident republicans in recent weeks, Martin McGuinness has told the BBC.
He also told the Talkback programme that the Irish government had been meeting with dissidents for years.
“They may well deny that, that doesn’t concern me in the least. I know it’s happening,” said the deputy first minister.
On Sunday, NI Secretary of State Owen Paterson denied that the government wanted discussions with dissidents.
He was rejecting claims in the Sunday Times that talks were being sought through intermediaries, despite opposition from the Irish government.
On Thursday, a spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin said “it has never been our practice to speak to these people”.
The Northern Ireland Office said: “Co-operation at every level between the UK and the Republic of Ireland is unprecedented and we are quite clear you cannot have meaningful talks with people who are not committed to peaceful means of pursuing their goals.”
A source close to dissident republicans told the BBC that there had been recent meetings with government intermediaries which focused on a dispute at Maghaberry Prison.
It is understood that in the course of those meetings, it had been mentioned that dissident bomb attacks were “not doing the prisoners’ case any good.”
Conservative MP Patrick Mercer said he would “not be surprised” if there were “covert conversations” between dissident groups and government bodies associated with the intelligence agencies.
However, he added that this was different from an official government policy of talking to dissident groups.
BBC chief political correspondent, Laura Kuenssberg, said she also understood that there had been contacts between dissident groups and the previous Labour government.
However, she added that the contacts were “very indirect” and a source had rejected the idea that there had been actual discussions between the former government and dissidents.
Analysis
Andy Martin BBC Ireland reporter
The Irish government has previously acknowledged that it has had contact with dissident republicans.
In 2003, the then Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern confirmed his special adviser Martin Mansergh spoke to the 32 County Sovereignty Movement, the political wing of the Real IRA, weeks before the Omagh bomb in 1998.
Another meeting with Mr Mansergh and dissidents took place at Christmas 1998.
Mr Mansergh in now a junior minister.
Mr Ahern also acknowledged that Fr Alex Reid, a key figure in the early stages of the peace process, acted an intermediary between the Irish government and dissidents.
Dialogue
Last Tuesday, a car packed with 200lbs of explosives was detonated outside Strand Road police station.
A number of security personnel have also been targeted with booby-trap bombs under cars.
Mr McGuinness said dissidents would not be allowed to bring down the devolved institutions.
He added that he understood that the governments would say his claims of talks were untrue, but that he “knew for a fact” that discussions had taken place.
“That suggests to me that these groups are recognising that at some stage they are going to have to wake up and smell the roses in terms of their inability to destroy the peace process,” he said.
DUP East Londonderry MP, Gregory Campbell, said if any discussions were taking place it was necessary to know who was involved and “on whose authority did they begin”.
He said:”If there are discussions with dissident republican terrorists who are carrying out murder, who authorised those discussions?
“If Martin McGuinness has any information about who began those discussions, let’s hear his information.”
Des Dalton of Republican Sinn Fein, which is associated with the Continuity IRA, dismissed Mr McGuinness’s claims as “black propaganda.”
Earlier this week, Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams wrote to all of the dissident republican groups hoping to persuade them to seek Irish unity through peaceful political means.