British and Northern Irish leaders welcomed reports on Thursday that three loyalist paramilitary groups have begun decommissioning their weapons as highly significant for the peace process.
“If these reports were to be confirmed, what we would see would be a seismic transformation within loyalism,” said Northern Ireland Secretary Shaun Woodward, while the province’s police chief said they were “very significant.”
The Protestant loyalist groups, so-called because they want Northern Ireland to stay part of Britain, were responsible for hundreds of deaths in the province during three decades of sectarian violence known as the Troubles.
The conflict ended with the Good Friday peace accords in 1998 and the Irish Republican Army (IRA), a largely Catholic group that wanted the British-ruled province to unite with Ireland, decommissioned its weapons seven years later.
Reports on Thursday suggested that the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) had now decommissioned a major weapons cache, and the Ulster Defence Association and Red Hand Commando had also made further disarmament moves.
Northern Ireland police chief Hugh Orde described the reports as “very significant,” saying: “I think it is a step change which shows a degree of organization and commitment that perhaps we have not seen before.”
In January, Woodward had extended decommissioning legislation for a year to provide loyalists with an opportunity to disarm, and Orde said this had put “additional pressure on these groups and they had to make a decision.”
The reports must be confirmed by the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (IICD), which is to report in August.
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