Key issue of paramilitary weapons

Weapons Surrender Parallel to Talks

But it insists that Sinn Fein would have to make an "absolute commitment" to non-violence before being granted a seat at the talks table.

The 12-page document, published by the Northern Ireland Office immediately after Tony Blair's statement to the Commons, says the two governments "share the view ... that voluntary and mutual decommissioning can be achieved only in the context of progress in comprehensive and inclusive political negotiations."

It suggests that Sinn Fein could have a critical role to play in encouraging a weapons surrender by the IRA.

"Those parties with some record of insight relating to the paramilitary organisations, who alone have the capacity to decommission, have an obvious importance in relation to this agenda, which, realistically, presupposes a fully inclusive process," says the document.

But it goes on to insist that any party invited to the Stormont talks would have to clarify its attitude to terrorist violence.

"If any party is invited to join (or rejoin) the negotiations, the chairman ... should convene a plenary meeting at the earliest practicable moment. At this meeting the party concerned would be required to affirm its total and absolute commitment to the principles of democracy and non-violence," says the document.

The document goes on to say that any party invited to the negotiations would have to commit itself unequivocally to several key points;

• Democratic and exclusively peaceful means of resolving political issues
• The total disarmament of all paramilitary organisations
• Agreeing that disarmament must be verifiable to the satisfaction of an independent commission
• Renouncing for themselves, and oppose any effort by others, to use or threaten to use force to influence the course or outcome of the negotiations
• Agree to abide by any agreement reached at the negotiations and to resort only to democratic, peaceful means to alter any aspect with which they do not agree
• Urging that "punishment" killings and beatings cease and to take effective steps to prevent such actions
• Agreeing that there should be an immediate and total end to violence in Northern Ireland, and working towards the earliest possible decommissioning of all paramilitary weapons.

It would operate on both sides of the Ulster border with immunity provided for by decommissioning legislation enacted in the British and Irish parliaments.

The commission would have its own independent legal and technical advisers and would be given appropriate access to the technical expertise of the British and Irish security services.

It would have responsibility for bringing forward detailed proposals on how a decommissioning scheme, or schemes, would work, and it could have a role in helping to verify decommissioning.

There would be two new sub-committees at the Stormont talks, one dealing with decommissioning, the other with community confidence-building measures.