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Searching for a formula

NOTHING highlights the difficulty of Prime Minister John Major's approach to Northern Ireland than his farcical confrontation with the belligerent Protestant leader, the Reverend Ian Paisley, in his Downing Street office. Mr Major was provoked into ordering Mr Paisley from the room by the Democratic Unionist's leader's refusal to accept his word that no deals had been done with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) to win peace. When the bully-boy failed to budge, Mr Major stalked out.

Mr Paisley is a buffoon and richly deserved the snub. But he represents an important and dangerous trend in Irish Protestant thinking that no British Conservative leader can afford to ignore. His Democratic Unionist Party, like the majority Ulster Unionist Party, is a useful ally against Tory rebels. The Prime Minister alienates them at his peril.

But with little to show for his premiership so far, Mr Major is desperate to be seen as the statesman who brought peace between Protestant and Catholic in Northern Ireland. He would like to be able to sit down with the leaders of Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA, and the Irish Government to negotiate a settlement that would be acceptable to Northern Ireland's Unionist majority. The time may never be ripe for such a solution. So far, Protestant objections and IRA equivocation make it impossible for Britain even to get to the negotiating table.

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