The Provisional IRA no longer poses a security threat, but dissident groups remain active, the International Monitoring Commission (IMC) said in its six-month report today.
Peter Hain
In its 14th report the IMC said the "Real IRA", which murdered 29 people in the 1998 Omagh bombing, is still intent on violence and is attempting to strengthen its capacities.
But the international four-man team, which is assessing paramilitary ceasefires and the British government's two-year demilitarisation programme in the North, stressed the splinter republican factions do not have the ability to mount a sustained terrorist campaign.
The report covers the period August 1st, 2006 to January 31st, 2007. The British programme of normalisation is due to end July 31st next, and the IMC will submit its final report on it in September 2007.
According to the IMC, the Provisionals remain committed to the political path, with no contemplation of a return to paramilitary activity. Operational structures have been disbanded, their paramilitary capabilities are deteriorating and the leadership has ordered its members not to carry out any acts of violence, it said.
With Sinn Féin declaring in January it would support the police in Northern Ireland, the report said: "We therefore conclude that terrorism and violence have been abandoned and that PIRA does not pose a threat relevant to security normalisation."
But the commissioners also delivered a serious assessment of rogue paramilitary groups opposed to the peace process.
"Dissident republicans remain a threat, both to the security forces in particular and the community more widely," they said. "They remain committed to terrorism and continue to engage in terrorist activity.
"They continue to take steps to reinforce their capacity as paramilitary organisations," the report added.
"During the period covered by this report, the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA) has at times been more dangerously active than at the time of our previous security normalisation report six months ago."
Another dissident faction, the Continuity IRA, also remains active, including by firing shots at a police station.
But the report added: "Although we do not believe that any of the dissident republican organisations have the capacity to mount a sustained and serious terrorist campaign, and there have been law enforcement successes against them, they therefore pose a continuing threat."
The commissioners reported another two British army bases were closed in the six months under review.
Overall sites have been reduced from 24 at the start of the operation to 20 now, and the target of 14 military installations by the end of the programme has been further reduced with the British government confirming another four can go.
The normalisation programme requires the Army's presence in Northern Ireland to be cut to a permanent garrison of 5,000, and the IMC report shows the authorities well on course to meet the target.
Tánaiste and Minister for Justice Michael McDowell welcomed the report and said it "offers further evidence of the great progress that has been made in transforming Northern Ireland into a society in which policing, supported by all sectors of the population, is seen as a part of everyday life.
"I look forward to the further significant step in this direction which will follow the restoration of devolution and the instalment in office of a power-sharing executive on March 26th."
Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain heralded the latest assessment as evidence that society in the North has been transformed.
"This report details what the people of Northern Ireland are already experiencing - that they are living in an increasingly normalised society," he said.