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Irish Catholic leader sees IRA "conciliatory" side

LONDON: Cardinal Cahal Daly, spiritual head of Ireland's four million Catholics, on Friday said he saw a "conciliatory" side to an IRA Easter message in which the guerrilla group said it had a right to wage war against Britain.

The defiant IRA message cast further gloom on faltering Anglo-Irish peace efforts over Northern Ireland, where the guerrilla group waged a 25-year battle against British rule.

In a statement issued in Dublin, the guerrilla leaders said: "The IRA, whose mandate for armed struggle derives from Britain's denial of the fundamental right of the Irish people to national self-determination and sovereignty, has made its position clear. We reaffirm that position."

But the IRA also pledged willingness to help unconditional peace talks. This brought "some hope", Daly said.

"Traditionally at Easter there is a belligerent statement, making no concessions and pledging victory," he told BBC radio.

"This time it is notably different, and they do commit themselves to working for conditions that would make all-party talks, without preconditions, possible. And it is, I think, for an Easter message, reasonably conciliatory."

This weekend is the 80th anniversary of the 1916 "Easter Rising" in Dublin against British rule of Ireland.

Northern Ireland Minister Sir Patrick Mayhew said the message showed the IRA was out of touch with the wishes of the Irish people.

Daly said London could now give reassurances that there would genuinely be no pre-conditions to all-party peace talks, and that all issues, not just the controversial demand that guerrillas give up their weapons, would be discussed.

But Daly added that the overwhelming majority of Irish people "would not countenance the beginning of talks without a cessation of violence, without the reinstatement of the ceasefire".

"In my view, there are better reasons now for the Republican movement to reinstate the ceasefire than there were even at the beginning, 17 or 18 months ago, to instate it in the first place," he said.

A surprise IRA ceasefire in August 1994 was later matched with a Protestant guerrilla truce.

Frustrated over what it saw as British foot-dragging over peace talks, the IRA broke the ceasefire with a bomb in London on February 9 that killed two people.-Reuter