Within the next few weeks, the IRA will make a big and possibly complete gesture on disarmament. After that, Sinn Fein will have to come to grips with policing.

It is something that the party has delayed for years and they are only doing it because they have run out of alternatives. They know that refusing to move forward would put all the political gains they have made so far at risk. Any move to resume violence would destroy their credibility with the electorate.

In these circumstances, it is very important that the British and Irish governments hold their nerve and make no allowances for slippage. They should not oil the wheels, they should not offer fresh concessions to reward republicans for acting in their own self-interest, and they should do nothing that has not been publicly agreed.

The rewards that are already in the pipeline are considerable and they will cause great difficulty to other political parties when they materialise. Adding to them would torpedo any chance we have of restoring power sharing in the north.

Later this year, both governments will bring forward legislation that will allow On the Run Terrorists (OTRs) to return home, face a brief judicial process and then be released on licence without serving a day in jail. One prisoner, Michael Rogan, who is currently in Maghaberry in Northern Ireland, will be let go immediately.

Rogan is on remand for the 1996 bomb attack on Thiepval barracks in Lisburn in which one soldier was killed. Seeing OTRs such as him walking out to cheering crowds, and other convicted or suspected killers returning home to hero’s welcomes will be a substantial morale boost for republicans. They don’t need anything more to add to the sweetness of the moment.

The Irish electorate can expect another Colombia Three moment when Paul Damery, wanted for the murder of the garda Jerry McCabe, is free to return home from his bolthole in Venezuela without risk of imprisonment. His return, even on a holiday, will no doubt prompt judicial challenges to the continued imprisonment of the so-called Castlerea Four for the same charge. They have release dates ranging from May 2007 until August 2009, yet Damery will not serve a day in jail. A good lawyer, and the Castlerea Four have the best, would make a great deal out of that anomaly.

Other incentives and sweeteners that are bound to come Sinn Fein’s way, if they keep their part of the bargain, include the continued demilitarisation of the north, the standing down of the Royal Irish Regiment’s Home Service battalions over a two-year period and the disbandment of the PSNI Reserve. A series of tribunals into disputed killings will also open and some sort of speaking right will be afforded Northern Ireland MPs in the Dail or its committees.

It is very much in the interests of society that the governments make sure that everything they do is matched by the republicans. In a letter to David Lidington, the Conservative party spokesman on Northern Ireland, Peter Hain indicates he intends to do so.

Referring to agreed plans to run down the RIR and demilitarise large areas of the north, Hain writes: “The steps outlined will be achieved over a two-year period only if there is an enabling security environment.”

However, past form does not give cause for optimism. One of the biggest weaknesses of the Good Friday agreement, a fatal flaw that made it impossible to sustain the institutions in the early years, was the haste with which prisoners were released without reciprocal gestures from the IRA.

Under the deal, decommissioning and prisoner releases were both intended to be completed within two years and the IRA campaign was said to have ended.

Common sense would have dictated that the two processes should have been linked and subject to political supervision. Instead, a commission was set up for the release of prisoners that included prisoners’ rights campaigners and which released inmates as quickly as legislation allowed. The result was that, after two years had elapsed, all the prisoners were long since out and not a single weapon had been decommissioned. Ever since, the IRA and Sinn Fein have been able to use their hidden guns to wring fresh concessions from the two governments at every point in negotiations.

Times Recommends

• Experts baffled by vanishing sea lions
• CIA caught in a dirty and secretive war
• Double life of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab