Loyalist paramilitaries have to end criminality if their representatives' words are to mean anything, nationalist SDLP leader Mark Durkan insisted today.
The Foyle MP welcomed the Ulster Political Research Group's criticism of DUP leader the Rev Ian Paisley's comments at an Independent Orange Order Twelfth of July demonstration that Sinn Féin would be in government over his community's dead bodies.
However Mr Durkan said the Ulster Defence Association-linked UPRG had to prove their soft spin after their meeting with Taoiseach Bertie Ahern in Dublin on Thursday was for real.
"We have had loyalist paramilitaries and loyalist paramilitary representatives before supporting the Good Friday Agreement and then going through phases of distancing themselves from it or pouring cold water on it," Mr Durkan insisted.
"In fact, their approach has been quite capricious. "What has to be welcomed from Thursday's meeting was the clear rejoinder to the language used by Ian Paisley.
However we should not be so naive as to ignore what UDA elements are still up to their necks in.
"For any paramilitary group the issue is not how well they can pose or how soft they can spin but whether or not they continue to organise and behave in a criminal way."