"Peace Train" Timetable

August 1994 - IRA announces "complete cessation" of violence from midnight.

October - Combined Loyalist Military Command announces ceasefire. John Major promises exploratory talks with Sinn Fein before the year is out. Those begin in December but flounder in early 1995.

January 1996 - International commission led by US Senator George Mitchell proposes all-party talks alongside phased surrender of terrorist weapons.

February - A massive bomb in London's Docklands signals the end of the IRA ceasefire. Two people are killed and 100 injured. The IRA claims the Government dragged its feet on setting a date for all-party talks.

Devastation after the Docklands bombing

March - Sinn Fein scores its highest ever share of the Northern Ireland vote (17%) when elections are held for the new Northern Ireland Forum for political dialogue. Gerry Adams says this is a mandate for his party's entry into negotiations, ceasefire or not.

June 10 - Sinn Fein is excluded from inter-party talks at Stormont and four days later boycotts the first meeting of the Forum.

July - Widespread violence erupts across the Province after the Drumcree Orange parade is forced down the nationalist Garvaghy Road in Portadown.

October - The Stormont talks move forward slightly with discussions on decommissioning.

December - John Major rejects the "Hume-Adams" proposals for a new IRA ceasefire.

January 1997 - Irish government severs official contact with Sinn Fein. The move is thought to have been sparked by an IRA shooting attempt in a Belfast children's hospital before Christmas. The Stormont talks are suspended after deadlock on arms decommissioning.

McGuinness and Adams: urged IRA ceasefire

May 2 - Sinn Fein enjoys its biggest ever General Election success with two MPs returned, Gerry Adams for west Belfast and Martin McGuinness for Mid Ulster.

May 16 - In a major speech in the Province newly-elected Tony Blair says his officials will hold exploratory talks with Sinn Fein who accept the offer. It is later revealed this contact continued despite the IRA's murder of two policemen in Lurgan.

July 6

• Drumcree Orange parade forced down the nationalist Garvaghy Road.
• In the aftermath the Orange Order calls off a number of contentious parades. In the following weeks, the Government hints at a softening of its position on the decommissioning of weapons, the main stumbling block to a new ceasefire according to republicans.
• A timetable is announced for talks, to start on September 15 with a settlement and referendum scheduled for May 1998.
• Ulster Secretary Mo Mowlam says any new ceasefire will be tested in word and deed by a six-week "quarantine" period after which Sinn Fein will be admitted to negotiations at Stormont.

Rev Ian Paisley: refuses talks with Sinn Fein

July 19 - IRA announces restoration of the 1994 ceasefire to take effect from noon next day. In the aftermath of the declaration unionists urgently seek assurances that some weapons will be handed over before or at the start of negotiations.

August 26 - Anglo-Irish International decommissioning body set up to oversee the handover of weapons. But unionists complain bitterly that this will have no power to make terrorists give up their arms.

August 28 - Mo Mowlam poised to announce the IRA ceasefire has been sufficiently well observed for Sinn Fein to enter talks on September 15. Sinn Fein's chief negotiator Martin McGuinness predicts a meeting with Tony Blair "within weeks".