DELEGATES at the multi party talks in Belfast, amid unionist recrimination, finally ended seven weeks of wrangling by agreeing procedures for the rest of the negotiations.
The adoption of the rules of procedure triggered squabbling between the two main unionist parties. The Ulster Unionist Party rejected a claim by the DUP that it had failed in its commitment to limit the role of the talks chairman, Mr George Mitchell, and Dublin's involvement in the process.
Mr Mitchell, the former US senator, had to travel to the US yesterday due to the death of his brother, Robert, in Waterville, Maine. Before leaving, his office issued a statement denying a British newspaper report he was threatening to withdraw from the talks.
"The recent press speculation about the senator quitting the talks is totally false and without any foundation whatsoever. Senator Mitchell will return and resume the chairmanship as soon as possible. He is determined to do all he can to make progress in the talks," the statement added.
Mr Mitchell welcomed the adoption of the procedures. "It does represent meaningful progress, and I am pleased that the participants will be able to move, beyond this discussion, on to the agenda and then into substantive and meaningful negotiations," he told reporters.
The DUP, with the support of Mr Robert McCartney's UK Unionist Party, failed to further modify compromise procedural rules put forward last week by Mr Mitchell. Nine amendments tabled by the DUP were overruled, and the procedures were finally agreed alter about only an hour of debate yesterday morning.
The Ulster Unionists, while initially supporting some of the amendments, finally agreed to have them over ruled when it became apparent there would, not be all party consensus on the issue.
This provoked immediate recrimination between the DUP and UUP with the former claiming Mr David Trimble's party had failed to restrict the Dublin government's interference in the talks.
The DUP complained that the adopted procedures ensured Mr Mitchell had an over arching role, that the original British Irish ground rules command paper was still in place, and that the North's union with Britain could be put on the agenda for negotiation.
"The DUP succeeded in having more rules amended than all other participants put together. The tragedy is that had the unionist family stood united and together we would have been successful in totally removing the Joint Dublin ground rules diktat.
That this has not happened is entirely Mr Trimble's responsibility," the DUP said in a statement.
The DUP said its delegates would walk out of the talks if the union was placed on the agenda. Mr Peter Robinson, deputy leader of the DUP, said he was prepared to discuss a number of constitutional issues, but if Dublin or the SDLP tried to put the union on the table then the DUP would not engage in such negotiation.
The Ulster Unionists, however, insisted that their policy in initiating the long running debate over procedures which began on June 12th, had been vindicated. They also insisted that Mr Mitchell's role had been limited.
"We have frustrated the attempts of the British and Irish governments in their ground rules document to effectively confine the negotiations to a nationalist agenda. The strait jacket designed for the process has been removed," the UUP added in a statement.
The party's deputy leader, Mr John Taylor, said that any agenda for the three stand discussions had to be agreed, and Ulster Unionists would not accept negotiation of the union. "We are not the sort of party that would walk out; other parties may behave like that," he added.
