Implementation
Direct London rule came to an end in Northern Ireland when power was formally devolved to the new Northern Ireland Assembly, the North-South Ministerial Council and the British-Irish Council when commencement orders for the British-Irish Agreement came into effect on 2 December 1999. However, Article 4(2) of the British-Irish Agreement (the Agreement between the British and Irish governments for the implementation of the Belfast Agreement) required the two governments to notify each other in writing of the completion of the requirements for the entry into force of the British-Irish Agreement; entry into force was to be upon the receipt of the latter of the two notifications.
The British government agreed to participate in a televised ceremony at Iveagh House in Dublin, the Irish department of foreign affairs. Peter Mandelson, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, attended early on 2 December 1999. He exchanged notifications with David Andrews, the Irish foreign minister. Shortly after the ceremony, at 10.30 am, the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern signed the declaration formally amending Articles 2 & 3 of the Irish Constitution. He then announced to the Dáil that the British-Irish Agreement had entered into force (including certain supplementary agreements concerning the Belfast Agreement).
The Assembly and Executive were eventually established in December 1999 on the understanding that decommissioning would begin immediately, but were suspended within two months due to lack of progress, before being re-established in May 2000 as Provisional IRA decommissioning eventually began. Aside from the decommissioning issue, however, ongoing paramilitary activity (albeit relatively low level compared to the past) by the Provisional Irish Republican Army—e.g., arms importations, smuggling, organised crime, "punishment beatings", intelligence-gathering and rioting—was also a stumbling block. The loyalist paramilitaries also continued similar activity although as they were not represented by a significant political party, their position was less central to political change.
The overall result of these problems was to damage confidence among unionists in the Agreement, which was exploited by the anti-Agreement DUP which eventually defeated the pro-Agreement Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) in the 2003 Assembly election. The UUP had already resigned from the power-sharing Executive in 2002 following arrests of Sinn Féin personnel on charges of gathering intelligence for use by terrorists. These charges were eventually dropped in 2005 on the controversial grounds that pursuit would not be "in the public interest". Immediately afterwards, one of the accused Sinn Féin members, Denis Donaldson was exposed as a British agent.
In 2004, negotiations were held between the two governments, the DUP, and Sinn Féin on an agreement to re-establish the institutions. These talks failed, but a document published by the governments detailing changes to the Belfast Agreement became known as the 'Comprehensive Agreement'. On 26 September 2005, however, it was announced that the Provisional Irish Republican Army had completely decommissioned its arsenal of weapons and "put them beyond use". Nonetheless, many unionists, most notably the DUP, remained sceptical and agreement on how to restore the power-sharing assembly still had not been reached as of July 2006. Of the loyalist paramilitaries, only the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) had decommissioned any weapons. Further negotiations took place in October 2006, leading to the St Andrews Agreement.
In May 2007, a power sharing executive was again established to govern Northern Ireland in devolved matters. The second Northern Ireland Executive consisted of the DUP and Sinn Féin, with Ian Paisley of the DUP as First Minister and Martin McGuinness of Sinn Féin as Deputy First Minister. Although Paisley was the head of the government, he and Martin McGuinness held equal powers within the Northern Ireland Assembly government.
Paisley retired from the office of First Minister and from the leadership of the DUP on 5 June 2008 and was succeeded in both functions by Peter Robinson. In the third Northern Ireland Executive the same political relationship now exists between Robinson and McGuinness as existed formerly between Paisley and McGuinness.
Read more about this topic: Good Friday Agreement