BELFAST Northern Ireland's Protestant Unionists on Monday rejected the chance to meet British Prime Minister Tony Blair who wants them to endorse his blueprint for peace for the province. "We don't think it is necessary to go like out-of-step schoolchildren to the headmaster's study," said senior negotiator Sir Reg Empey, responding to reports that the 27 Ulster Unionists in the new Northern Ireland assembly could meet Blair in Downing Street this week.

"We will continue to have negotiations with Mr Blair but it will be through our leader and negotiating team," he said. Adding to Blair's complex task of convincing sceptical Unionists to back the peace plan, was the reaction of the Republican Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams. He dismissed the British Prime Minister's promise to Unionists on Monday that Sinn Fein could be thrown out of the new government if the Irish Republican Army (IRA) fails to disarm by May 2000. "There is no question of the British government introducing legislation to expel Sinn Fein," he said.

"Mr Blair knows this would be a breach of the Good Friday Agreement," signed in April 1998 between Protestants and Roman Catholics, he added. (AFP)