Durkan: On the attack

A senior nationalist politician has accused Sinn Fein of being more interested in "protecting the self image of the IRA" than enhancing the Good Friday agreement.

Speaking on Sunday, SDLP leader Mark Durkan hit out at the way current negotiations to review the suspended Belfast assembly are being conducted.

The British and Irish governments have put forward proposals to end the impasse, but the full details are believed to have been made available only to Sinn Fein and the DUP.

Durkan said the details should "be shared with those who originally negotiated the agreement and not just between two parties if it is going to have credibility".

"We know the reason why the SDLP has not been given full sight - not because we cannot be trusted to leak them but because we cannot be relied upon to not speak the truth," he said.

"If there are flaws or problems, we will point it out in an attempt to rectify them.

"That is what we did before the Leeds Castle talks, during them and after them.

"One of our concerns right now is that a large part of the negotiations in recent weeks have focussed on the terms of decommissioning and it appears Sinn Fein has concentrated a lot of their efforts on protecting the self image of the IRA.

"We do not think they have spent as much time on protecting the interests of the nationalist people and pro-agreement supporters generally."

Durkan also warned that the negotiations appear to have given the DUP "a veto not only over how a nationalist minister exercises power but a veto over the very appointment of certain nationalists".