The Northern Ireland Secretary, Mr Paul Murphy, has recommended that financial sanctions be imposed on Sinn Féin because of its links to criminal IRA activity.
The sanctions are minimal, largely symbolic, in the circumstances in which democratic parties find themselves since the Northern Bank robbery. But they emphasise the rule of law, due process and democratic structures. They are intended to send out a key message to the electorate.
At this time of confusion, anxiety and contradiction within the peace process, it is important for republicans to accept the need for closure. There is no going back to war. And a halfway house that involves paramilitary and criminal activity is politically unsustainable. Sinn Féin signed up to the Belfast Agreement under which its political objective of a united Ireland can be achieved by agreement and through peaceful means. Its leaders must now convince the IRA of the correctness of that choice and of the need to abide by the will of the people.
There were predictable objections from Sinn Féin yesterday to the sanctions proposed by Mr Murphy. But the Northern Secretary was only giving effect to recommendations from the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) which found the IRA to be responsible for the Northern Bank robbery and for three other multi-million pound thefts. These crimes, it concluded, had been committed with the prior knowledge and approval of senior Sinn Féin members. Had the party been in a power-sharing government, the IMC would have recommended its suspension.
The importance of the IMC report, however, has been overtaken by events in this State where the huge IRA money-laundering operation has been uncovered by the Garda Síochána and cash amounting to €3 million seized. Some of that money almost certainly came from the Northern Bank. The seizures, along with Garda raids on the offices of solicitors and accountants, have drawn public attention to the extent of republican criminal activity, including diesel-washing and cigarette- smuggling, in a manner which has never happened before.
Subsequently, the Minister for Justice, Mr McDowell, has classified the IRA as a colossal crime machine. He has drawn on security briefings, in a courageous if unorthodox way, to publicly identify Mr Gerry Adams, Mr Martin McGuinness and Mr Martin Ferris as members of the IRA army council. His intervention may be popular with supporters of the Progressive Democrats. But the Taoiseach has sought to calm the political climate to distance himself from these remarks.
The differences between them, however, seem more matters of tactics rather than strategy. Given the investment by the Taoiseach - and his predecessors - in building the peace process over a decade, it is understandable that Mr Ahern would seek to make space for the leadership of Sinn Féin to seek an end to all IRA activities. For there is a universal acceptance that the days of constructive ambiguity are over.