The IRA pledges a farewell to arms
Thursday the Irish Republican Army, after decades of terror, announced it would permanently abandon military operations.
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Heritage's Hulsman says what may keep the two sides moving forward is the PR battle they are currently locked in. A combination of factors - a wish to put off the "terrorist" label, demographics that suggest Northern Ireland's Catholics could become the majority in a generation, and Ireland's booming economy - all favor the IRA's move out of violence, he says.
Guelke agrees. "They realized they had to get finally and fully out of the terrorism business - or risk what was liable to become an association with jihadist terrorism," he says.
Major events in the struggle over Northern ireland:
1921: South declares free state. Civil war rages for two years. Northern Protestants remain loyal to Britain.
1937: Irish Free State (26 counties in south and west Ireland) proclaims independence, not recognized by Britain until 12 years later.
1955-62: Sporadic attacks by the Catholic Irish Republican Army against British in Northern Ireland and England.
1968: N. Irish Catholics launch civil rights campaign.
1969: British army sent to Northern Ireland to quell worst clashes in 50 years.
1972: British troops kill 13 Catholic protesters on "Bloody Sunday" in Londonderry.
1972: British government introduces direct rule in N. Ireland.
1979: IRA steps up attacks on prominent Britons.
1981: Ten IRA prisoners starve to death in hunger strike designed to secure political-prisoner status.
1982: N. Ireland assembly elected; boycotted by Catholics.
1984: IRA bomb at British Conservative Party conference kills five.
1985: Anglo-Irish agreement gives Dublin government a consultative voice in N. Ireland.
1994: IRA announces cease-fire, matched by pro-British guerrillas. British officials hold first open meeting with Sinn Fein in more than 70 years.
1996: IRA ends cease-fire; multi-party talks on the future of N. Ireland begin; Sinn Fein is excluded.
1997: Adams and chief negotiator Martin McGuiness win seats in British parliament but decline to take them up. IRA announces "unequivocal" ceasefire. Two Protestant parties quit talks in protest at lack of IRA commitment to hand in its arms.
1998: "Good Friday" peace deal follows marathon talks to end conflict and devolve rule. Elections to a new Northern Ireland Assembly held; Protestant Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) leader David Trimble elected first minister designate. Car bomb in Omagh, N. Ireland, kills 29 in worst single attack in nearly 30 years of violence. IRA splinter group claims responsibility.
1999: Province gets own government in which Catholics and Protestants share power, ending 27 years of rule from London.
2001: Trimble resigns over IRA failure to disarm; reelected when IRA puts some arms beyond use.
2003: Assembly elections boost hard-liners.
2004: Blair and Ahern open summit to reach a deal. IRA guerrillas later refuse the photographing of their disarmament, the last sticking point in the drive for a political settlement.
2005: Trimble resigns as leader of the UUP after poor results in Britain's election. Hard-line Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) of Ian Paisley surges ahead. IRA pledges to dump arms, commits to political solution in N. Ireland.
Source: Reuters
