“Positive”: that’s how Lord Eames, Primate of the Anglican Church of Ireland, the second most important Protestant church in Northern Ireland after the Presbyterian Church, called his meeting with Gerry Adams, President of Sinn Fein, the political party that represents the military wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), in Belfast on 23 October. Accompanied by four Anglican bishops, Eames went to the Parliament House of Stormont, in Belfast, on 23 October to meet the Sinn Fein leader. After speaking with Adams for an hour and a half, he emphasized the need for “a full participation in the structures of democracy including support for the police”. Sinn Fein’s support for the Northern Ireland police force is in fact the main stumbling block to the peace process revived two weeks ago with a programme of joint efforts on the part of the Irish and British governments aimed at re-establishing a devolved power-sharing government in Belfast by 26 March 2007. Sinn Fein wants the control of the system of justice in the province to be devolved to Parliament, while the Protestants of the Democratic Unionist Party want Sinn Fein to support the Northern Ireland police force. The two parties refuse to meet each other for the time being, and that’s why the meeting between Adams and Eames and that between the Protestant leader Ian Paisley and the Catholic Primate Cardinal Sean Brady, held at St. Andrew’s (Scotland) two weeks ago, are so important. Adams, for his part, explained that he had discussed the problem of sectarianism with the Anglican archbishop: “one of the ruins – he said – of our society. A religious community ought to feel itself secure and see its own rights guaranteed”. He called his meeting with Eames “a significant part” of the strategy of Sinn Fein to find an agreement with the Protestant Churches”.
