THE majority of people in Northern Ireland believe that the paramilitaries should hand over all or some of their guns and explosives before entering all party talks, according to a new poll.
Only 13 per cent of people questioned said the IRA and loyalist paramilitaries should be allowed to maintain their arsenals while talks proceed, the poll by MRC (Ireland) for the Belfast Telegraph has found.
The poll also reported that Protestants believed the Irish Government and the SDLP had played as positive a role as the Ulster Unionist Party, and a far greater role than the DUP, in advancing the peace process. A substantial 60 per cent of people interviewed favoured the decommissioning be all paramilitary weapons ahead of all party dialogue, while an additional 23 per cent said some weapons should be handed over before talks.
Most of the 1,051 people surveyed, despite their concerns over decommissioning, believed the cease fires would hold during 1996. Catholics, at 66 per cent, expressed more faith than Protestants, at 53 per cent, in the cease fires continuing.
Attitudes towards decommissioning broke down along fairly predictable lines although a significant number of SDLP supporters favoured all weapons being handed over. A total of 76 per cent of Ulster Unionist Party supporters and 84 per cent of DUP supporters favoured total disarmament.
A total of 40 per cent of SDLP supporters also favoured total decommissioning with a further 34 per cent favouring partial disarmament. Most Sinn Fein supporters 63 per cent believed stalks should begin without any disarmament.
Most supporters of the loyalist fringe parties the Ulster Democratic Party (81 per cent) and the Progressive Unionist Party (66 per cent) favoured decommissioning of all weapons, while 49 per cent of those surveyed said the recent killings of alleged drug dealers, understood to be the work of the IRA, were a breach of the ceasefire.
More than 68 per cant of Protestants said the Government made a positive contribution with 62 per cent making the same comment about the SDLP.
This contrasts with 69 per cent of Protestants saying the Ulster Unionist Party made a positive contribution 44 per cent said the DUP had been positive but 46 per cent more of Protestants said the DUP had been negative in this regard.
Fifty seven per cent of all those questioned felt that Sinn Fein was either negative or very negative in moving the process forward. However, 60 per cent of Catholics said Sinn Fein had been positive with, rather surprisingly, 22 per cent of Protestants agreeing.
One third of Catholics said they would blame the British government if violence resumed, with only one in 20 Protestants holding that view 44 per cent of Protestants said they would blame the IRA for a resumption of violence while 14 per cent of Catholics would blame the IRA.
