The Irish Republican Army declared an end to 35 years of armed struggle today and ordered its members to dump their arms and pursue their political goals by "exclusively peaceful means".

The move was hailed as historic and momentous in London, Dublin and Washington, although unionist leaders in Belfast were predictably sceptical and said that they would wait until the IRA's deeds matched its rhetoric before celebrating.

Tony Blair hailed the long-awaited IRA statement as "a step of unparalleled magnitude in the recent history of Northern Ireland" and said that he looked forward to the day when power-sharing government returns to the province.

"This may be the day when finally, after all the false dawns and dashed hopes, peace replaced war, politics replaces terror on the island of Ireland," the Prime Minister said.

The IRA, which has observed a ceasefire since 1997, said it would end all armed activity from 1600BST today, three hours after the statement was delivered. But it said that it would not - despite Unionist demands - formally disband.

In the 14-paragraph statement, the IRA's Army Council told its "Volunteers" not just that they should get rid of their weapons but that they "must not engage in any other activities whatsoever". For the British Government that phrase was seen as a crucial pledge to end criminality.

The statement begins: "The leadership of Oglaigh na hEireann has formally ordered an end to the armed campaign. This will take effect from 4pm this afternoon.

"All IRA units have been ordered to dump arms. All Volunteers have been instructed to assist the development of purely political and democratic programmes through exclusively peaceful means. Volunteers must not engage in any other activities whatsoever.

"The IRA leadership has also authorised our representative to engage with the IICD (Independent International Commission on Decommissioning) to complete the process to verifiably put its arms beyond use in a way which will further enhance public confidence, and to conclude this as quickly as possible.

"We have invited two independent witnesses, from the Protestant and Catholic churches, to testify to this."

It is understood that General John de Chastelain, the Canadian who has been acting as a monitor for the arms decommissioning process, has been moving around in the Irish Republic for the last couple of days. This may signal that the the process of putting arms beyond use has already begun.

The IRA made its decision after an internal debate prompted by the call in April by Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein president, for it to pursue its goals exclusively through political means. During almost 30 years of the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland, the IRA was blamed for about 1,800 murders.

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