Trimble calls for debate on IMC report

Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble has called for an urgent debate on the latest report of the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) and challenged the Government to recall the Assembly so Sinn Fein can face exclusion.

Mr Trimble was speaking in the House of Commons when he highlighted the clear recommendation of the fourth report of the Independent Monitoring Commission, which was published yesterday, that if the Assembly was sitting, Sinn Fein should be excluded from office.

He then asked Leader of the House, Peter Hain MP, to arrange a debate on the matter as soon as possible “so that we can establish a consensus, call on the Government to recall the Assembly and support the passing of a motion to exclude Sinn Fein, take the necessary action and rectify the anomaly of Sinn Fein’s privileged position here at Westminster?”

Responding, Mr Hain said: “Obviously, as we set up the Independent Monitoring Commission, we take any report from it or recommendation that it makes seriously, and my Right Honourable Friend the Secretary of State will take careful note of what it says.”

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, meanwhile, has dismissed Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams's call to arrest him.

Yesterday, Mr Adams challenged Mr Ahern to "put up or shut up" after the IMC report backed the Taoiseach’s claim that Sinn Fein leaders knew the IRA planned the Northern Bank raid.

"The one thing we don't do in our kind of politics is go around picking up people off the streets, that's other political people do that," Mr Ahern said.

"Politicians don't collect evidence, that's why I was intrigued by what he said yesterday, but quite frankly, I don't know what he was talking about.

"All that we were stating was facts and now the facts have been collaborated by the Garda, by the British government, by the PSNI, by everybody, so I mean it's a senseless thing.”

Mr Adams said he feared Mr Ahern was intent on criminalising his party and its electorate, saying it was about "electoralism".

(MB/SP)