Spring at impromptu news conference

Spring Shocks Unionists

The Dublin Foreign Minister made his comment during a stopover in Londonderry, Northern Ireland, en route to canvassing in neighbouring Donegal for next month's Irish General Election. Mr Spring said the growth in Sinn Fein support in recent elections signalled "a vote for peace and a vote for the direction in which the majority of people on this island want to go".

The comments run directly counter to an earlier statement by Irish Prime Minister John Bruton that a vote for Sinn Fein represented backing for IRA violence "and its campaign of killing and murder".

Mr Spring appears to be at odds not only with his Prime Minister, but also the Irish Justice Minister, Nora Owen. Ms Owen is deputy leader of Mr Bruton's Fine Gael party, and has issued a statement saying "We must avoid the appalling prospect of any government being dependent on Sinn Fein to elect a Taoiseach (Prime Minister) or to keep that government in power."

Spring and Hume meet at airport

Asked if he agreed with Mr Spring's comment, Mr Hume said: "Well, in the election, the IRA campaign was still under way and as I made it clear, Sinn Fein and the IRA belong to the Republican movement and that has been the case since their very foundation. Therefore I was making it clear during the election campaign that people should show that they were very much against violence."

But Democratic Unionist Party security spokesman Gregory Campbell said: "I think this is the most outrageous comment to come from Dick Spring in many weeks and months. I think unionists will be completely and utterly appalled. They know and everybody knows, the world and it's dog knows, that a vote for Sinn Fein is a vote for violence rather than a vote away from violence."

David Wilshire said Mr Spring was trying to win his own election campaign on the back of Sinn Fein.

A former member of the Northern Ireland select committee and vice-chairman of the Tory backbench Northern Ireland committee, Mr Wilshire said, "I am appalled that he is grubbing around for votes in his election by pandering to psychopaths and murderers. "He ought to have the guts to say `These people are evil' instead of trying to win his election campaign on the back of them."

"There is an opportunity there to end the cycle of violence, to accept that there are democratic possibilities and to have an IRA ceasefire as quickly as possible," he said.

Sinn Fein, he continued, had strengthened its mandate in recent elections, and "should use that mandate and give the people of Ireland what they want - and that is peace. They have increased their vote, and I would hope that those who have to make decisions will accept that want people want is peace."