The contrast was there for all to see. As the photos flashed around the world of the historic handshake between Albert Reynolds, the Irish prime minister, and Gerry Adams with John Hume, Social Democratic and Labour Party leader, on the steps of the Irish parliament, the pro-British loyalist leader, the Reverend Ian Paisley, was being kicked out of number 10 Downing Street by John Major and told never to come back. This epitomises the problem for the Unionist community.
Sinn Fein chairperson Mitchell McLaughlin explains:
"The Unionist leadership fear change, however limited. They feel more secure with the failed policies of the past than with the prospect of building a better, a different future. Yet, the partition of Ireland has not only failed nationalists, it has also failed Unionists. It has encouraged in them a paranoid distrust of all nationalists. And despite deals between some Unionists and the British government, most Unionists do not trust the British.
"Consequently, Unionists face a future of unremitting uncertainty, dependent upon the whims of whichever British government is in power, fearful of the encroaching tide of history which year by year undermines the artificial majority created in 1921.
"The British have spent millions of pounds in propaganda to try to portray what is happening in the north of Ireland as irrational sectarian strife. But the division of our people was institutionalised by partition. Partition not only ensured division; the nature of the six county state demanded division for its survival.
"Sinn Fein is firmly convinced that as long as Unionists are assured of a veto over change, then there is neither reason nor incentive for them to move beyond the laager wall.
"Sinn Fein have said that we need and want the consent, agreement and involvement of Unionists in deciding the future of this country. But to deliberately confuse the issue of consent with the upholding of a veto over any change at all is to perpetuate division and conflict.
"The partition of Ireland was brought about by a British act of parliament for which not a single Irish vote was cast."
One week after the IRA cease-fire, the Combined Loyalist Military Command, representing the loyalist death squads, issued a statement listing a number of their concerns, which they say, if addressed, could lead them to "make a meaningful contribution towards peace".