Conger

PLANNED cuts in government programmes that would have brought the loyalist paramilitary group the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) in from the cold have been attacked by the Irish Primate.

In his first synod address as Archbishop of Armagh last week, the Most Rev Alan Harper called upon the UDA to lay down its arms as ‘the war is over.’ Whatever justification the UDA may have ‘pleaded for retaining weapons of lethal force, that justification no longer exists,’ he said.

The Irish church leader said that while the “pressing issues facing the community in loyalist areas” must be addressed “with very great urgency”, holding onto “weaponry will make any contribution whatsoever to addressing and solving those problems” all the harder.

“I do recognize that, after years of conflict and the experience of a culture of lawlessness and criminality, it is difficult to feel sufficiently secure and sufficiently respected to set your weaponry aside. However, weaponry has nothing to contribute to transforming the life of Loyalist communities,” Dr. Harper said.

However, the government had a responsibility to facilitate the transition away from violence. Plans to cut funding for the Northern Ireland governments Conflict Transformation Initiative (CTI) were misguided, Dr. Harper said.

The CTI, which seeks to lead the UDA and other protestant paramilitary groups out of violence through dialogue and social reform, has been threatened with a cut off of funds by the Social Development Minister Margaret Ritchie who said on Aug 10 “to support and facilitate the UDA in moving away from paramilitarism towards some sort of normality would not have been my top priority for £1.2 million of scarce resources.”

However, Dr. Harper said the CTI had the “capacity to reach elements of the loyalist community who are hardest of all to reach.”

“The CTI was intended to be a process through which people who have been left behind, or have otherwise resorted to anti-social actions and engagements, can re-establish self respect, acquire life and work skills, re-connect with the true character of their cultural heritage, relate respectfully and peaceably with their Catholic neighbours and move on from the destructive and ultimately sterile ways of the past,” he argued.

Such an experiment was “worth pursuing,” he said, urging the government to continue its support for the peace process, while also appealing to the UDA “not to be deflected from the path of decommissioning” its weapons.