Monitor

All the News of the World The Sunday papers on the deadline for agreement in Northern Ireland

NOBODY IS asking the IRA to surrender to the British Army. In the next three days it has merely to show the decommissioning body that it has permanently abandoned the armalite for the ballot box.

The Sunday Times

BRINKMANSHIP AND Irish politics are bedfellows. But it is difficult to see what compromise can be found. It is surely up to Mr Adams to go the extra mile. More than 70 per cent of the people in the province endorsed the new hope for peace. To betray that vote now is to abandon democracy and once again give reign to the minority who ignore the ballot box in favour of the armalite.

The Mail on Sunday

IF THE Northern Ireland Assembly is not sorted out by Wednesday, all could be lost. Leaders of both Republican and Loyalist communities must now put pressure on the hardliners to reach a compromise before it is too late.

Sunday People

NORTHERN IRELAND now faces a grim summer, and grimmer political decisions. But it is not a choice, as Blair still pretends, between violence and peace. If Sinn Fein ministers are allowed to take up office, while the IRA is both armed and active, the representatives of violence will be placed at the very heart of government.

(Jenny McCartney)

The Sunday Telegraph

EACH SIDE - Unionist and Republican - needs to recognise the insecurity of the other and create more time and space for trust to grow organically within the community. When that happens, the issue of when and how to dispose of the Semtex, AK-47s, machine pistols and the rest will shrink to manageable proportions.

The Independent on Sunday

AS WEDNESDAY'S deadline nears, it seems increasingly likely that it will not be met. A return to the bombings and murders that have been replaced by jobs and prosperity during the past two years in Northern Ireland must not be allowed to happen.

Sunday Express