Decommissioning in Northern Ireland - Decommissioning Troubles

Decommissioning Troubles

Into late 2001, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) was reluctant to disarm. The IRA refused to disarm because they said that the British government had reneged on its side of the bargain, by watering down reforms of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and by failing to pull troops out of Northern Ireland.

After the original deadline for decommissioning - May 2000 - passed, the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning set June 30, 2001. That date passed as well without full disarmament.

The crisis hit its climax in July 2001 as David Trimble, the Ulster Unionist leader, resigned as first minister of the power-sharing Northern Ireland executive in protest against the IRA failure to redeem its pledge to put its weapons "completely and verifiably beyond use" (he was later reelected). The peace process was on the brink of collapse again after the Provisional IRA failed to convince the UK Government or the Ulster Unionists that they had made "sufficient progress towards decommissioning".