Mitchel opens Ard Fheis
``This weekend's Ard Fheis takes place at a time of great uncertainty
and no little cynicism,'' said party chairperson and Six-County EU
election candidate Mitchel McLaughlin as he opened Sinn Fein's last
Ard Fheis before the millennium.
McLaughlin, reflecting the unease that republicans are feeling with
the lack of progress in the peace process, stated: ``The most pressing
issue for Sinn Féin and the one which preoccupies the party's daily
work is the peace process''.
d although he addressed the tragic events of the last year, which
saw the Omagh bomb and its multiple deaths and the ongoing loyalist
campaign of violence against nationalists, including the killing of
Rosemary Nelson and the siege of the Garvaghy Road, McLaughlin said
that the challenge for us all is that ``unionists and nationalists
work together in the search for peace.
``The last year was a challenging time for republicans but we
positively set about the task of making our contribution to shaping
the new political conditions promised by the Good Friday Agreement.
It is worth remembering that republicans took great risks when they
endorsed the Agreement, when they voted to end abstentionism to a
northern Assembly, to support the referenda and accepted changes in
relation to Articles 2&3. We took those risks and we accepted the
pain because of our commitment to the peace process and because we
were determined to deliver on the obligations we had entered into the
Good Friday Agreement. We have delivered `big time'.''
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