Adams: IRA backs peace process

The Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, yesterday delivered an interim response to Tony Blair's call for the disbandment of the IRA, saying he envisaged a future without the organisation.

Mr Adams told party members in Monaghan in the Irish Republic that he believed the IRA was serious about their support for a genuine peace process.

However, the Sinn Fein leader struck an unusually tentative note in his remarks, declining to give a definitive response to the speech delivered recently by Mr Blair in Belfast, when the Prime Minister set out his view that Unionists were unlikely to go back into government with Sinn Fein ministers while the IRA was seen to remain active.

Confining himself largely to generalities, Mr Adams declared: "Our strategy, and Mr Blair knows this, is about bringing an end to physical force republicanism by creating an alternative way to achieve democratic and republican objectives."

Mr Adams said the IRA "is never going to disband'' in response to ultimatums from the British Government or from the Ulster Unionist leader, David Trimble.

The lack of specifics in the republican leader's speech reflects the uncertainty and lack of direction evident at the moment in the Irish peace process.

At the moment republicans are grappling with the problem of how, and indeed whether, the almost complete lack of trust between the two sides can be bridged.

Negotiations among the parties are expected to be held before the end of the year, but no structure has yet been set out for these.