Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson Resigns Thursday Sep 10,2015

 

Peter Robinson is quitting Northern Ireland's power-sharing government, along with all but one of his Democratic Unionist cabinet colleagues. 

Peter Robinson said on Thursday evening Sep 10,2015, shortly after rival parties rejected his proposal to suspend the Stormont parliament in Northern Ireland, that he would uphold his earlier threat and quit government. Robinson's Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which favors continued UK membership, is the largest in the assembly.
"In light of the decision to continue with business as usual in the Assembly, I am therefore standing aside as first minister and other DUP ministers will resign with immediate effect with the exception of Arlene Foster,"

Peter Robinson told after crisis talks in Belfast. "I have asked Arlene to remain in her post as finance minister and acting first minister to ensure that nationalists and republicans are not able to take financial and other decisions that may be detrimental to Northern Ireland."

An initial statement from David Cameron's spokeswoman on Thursday evening said only that the British prime minister was "gravely concerned" by developments, and that "we want to see all politicians in Northern Ireland working together to build a better future for the country."

Peter Robinson also said on Thursday Sep 10,2015 that multi-party talks in Northern Ireland would continue despite his resignation as first minister.

An August 2015 murder, linked to the IRA by police, brought on the breakdown. 

The murder in August 2015 of Kevin McGuigan, an alleged former Irish Republican Army (IRA) hit man, helped bring Northern Ireland's power sharing government to the brink of collapse.

Kevin McGuigan(58)was shot dead outside home in east Belfast by men wearing black masks and carrying automatic weapons

Kevin McGuigan's funeral, his coffin draped in the flag of the Irish Republic, with which Nationalists closely identify

The police said that it suspected the IRA in the killing - a move that put nationalist party Sinn Fein under pressure. Several high profile arrests followed, not least that of senior Sinn Fein figure Bobby Storey in Belfast on Wednesday. He was released the next day. 

During the roughly 30 years of sectarian violence known as The Troubles, Sinn Fein was the political wing of the IRA.

Peter Robinson and the DUP alleged that the killing showed both that the IRA existed, and was still active and armed, in breach of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that underpins the power-sharing agreement at Stormont.

Sinn Fein - a predominantly Catholic party advocating that Northern Ireland leave the UK to join with Ireland - maintains that the IRA is no longer active. Its leader, Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness, said he believed Robinson's plans to quit were down to "inter-party rivalry" between the DUP and fellow pro-UK party the Ulster Unionist Party, which itself resigned from the government on Monday. Suspending the parliament, he said ahead of Thursday's vote, would be a mistake.
"I think it would send a very negative message and would be grist to the mill of those who in the past have tried to plunge us back to the past," McGuinness said.