For the past 36 years, the Irish Republican Army has been waging an armed campaign against British rule in Northern Ireland. The IRA has been fighting the British Army and security forces as well as pro-British paramilitary groups as it tried to reach its ultimate goal, a united Ireland. More than 3,600 people have been killed during the past three decades that have come to be known as "The Troubles."
In a statement released at the end of July, the IRA said it has formally ordered an end to its armed campaign. It instructed its units, in the statement's words, "to dump arms" and said IRA members must now focus on "purely political and democratic programs through exclusively peaceful means." The statement also called on IRA volunteers not to engage "in any other activities."
The British and Irish governments welcomed the IRA decision, but in Northern Ireland, reaction was mixed, split along sectarian lines. Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA reacted positively while the largest pro-British party, the Democratic Unionists, urged caution.
Stephen O'Reilly is deputy editor of Belfast's Irish News, a newspaper reflecting the views of the Nationalist community that favors union with Ireland. He says the IRA decision to renounce violence is a very important development. However, the reaction within his community has been far more muted compared to 1997 when the IRA declared a ceasefire.
"And if you were to compare it to what happened seven or eight years ago, we had cavalcades of cars, we had all sorts of celebrations, all sorts of protests from various other people," said Mr. O'Reilly. "This time it's been slightly more muted and it's probably a little bit of war weariness, for want of a better word, if that's not too ironic - war weariness in the sense that this has been a long, tortuous process and for every step forward, there appears to have been half a step backwards."
On the other side of the sectarian divide, there also appears to be a sense of war weariness. But the Unionist side, those who favor Northern Ireland's continued union with Great Britain, don't take the IRA's words at face value. Austin Hunter is editor of the Belfast Newsletter, a newspaper with close ties to the pro-British community.
"As far as the Unionists are concerned, they just want to see the words and the promises of the IRA turned into action, or I suppose, in a way turned to 'inaction,'" he explained. "The fact that they will stop their paramilitary activities, they will stop their criminality and we will all be allowed to have peace and prosperity. The conflict has been going on in Northern Ireland for 35 years. The whole conflict has cost 3,600 lives. We just want to make sure it's stopped. There still will be various splinter groups, small splinter groups who will still want to continue their evil. But we want to make sure that the biggest and most active terrorist organization, the IRA, has actually gone away for good. And the best way to test the sincerity of that statement is to examine it and monitor it in the months ahead."
Experts say monitoring the IRA's commitment to lay down its weapons will be crucial in reviving the Northern Ireland power-sharing agreement between Nationalists and Unionists, Catholics and Protestants. The Northern Ireland Assembly, bringing together politicians from both sides, was suspended in 2002 after Unionist politicians refused to work with Sinn Fein, the IRA's political wing. The Unionists accused the IRA of not being serious in wanting to put away its weapons for good.
Paul Bew is an expert on Northern Ireland, teaching at Queen's University in Belfast. He has written extensively on "The Troubles" and says while the IRA statement makes clear the armed struggle is over, it omits one essential point.
"The IRA is not disbanding," said Mr. Bew. "It is retaining its mission statement. It is maintaining still the right to launch a campaign of armed struggle. So, in some ways, it remains still a subversive organization. And therefore, remains as the Irish government has made clear since the statement came out, an illegal organization in Irish society. It has not moved itself to the point where it ceased to be illegal."
Mr. Bew says the crucial part of the IRA's statement is when the paramilitary group urges its members to refrain from engaging in what it broadly calls "any other activities." Mr. Bew says those activities have contributed in destabilizing the Northern Ireland political process.