Mitchell believes peace process difficulties can be overcome

The former Chairman of the Stormont talks, Senator George Mitchell, has said that he believes the difficulties dogging the peace process can still be overcome. Senator Mitchell was speaking in Belfast before his installation as the eighth Chancellor of Queen's University. Earlier, the Deputy First Minister, Seamus Mallon, warned against putting off key political decisions, saying that it invited international ridicule.

Sinn Féin's chief negotiator told members of the United States Congress that the Good Friday agreement is in serious trouble and that drastic action will be needed to rescue it. However, Martin McGuinness said that he saw no merit in proposals for creating a shadow executive in Northern Ireland until the decommissioning row can be resolved. Mr McGuinness is on a three-day visit to the United States.

Martin McGuinness told a press conference on Capitol Hill he had come to Washington with a warning: that drastic action is needed to save the Good Friday agreement. He said that British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, had the responsibility for pushing the process forward and he had strong words for the chairman of the Independent Decommissioning Body. He said that General John De Chastelain must assert his independence from prescriptions laid down by David Trimble and lead from the front.

He emphatically rejected proposals for a shadow executive in Northern Ireland, adding that, if the peace process were parked in such a way, there would be nothing left by the end of the summer. Mr McGuinness delivered this message to some powerful Congressman, all of them members of the House International Relations Committee, but not all of them the usual Irish-Americans.

After the meeting, Congressman Peter King said that his message had sounded an alarm bell, while Congressman Jim Walsh said that it was essential the parties should stick with the Good Friday agreement. Martin McGuinness completes his three-day visit to the United States later today when he meets two of President Clinton's foreign policy advisers at the White House.