It appears, for once, that the British Prime Minister's description of this development as one of "unparalleled magnitude" lends itself more to truth than rhetoric.How sad for him that what should have been a legacy of helping to bring peace where so many others failed, will be dwarfed by the fall-out from his disastrous international military adventures The Troubles' final death toll rests at 3,700. After all, if the Republicans renounce the armed struggle, what barriers now exist to power sharing?The IRA statement says: "The overwhelming majority of people in Ireland ... want to see the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement." However, we must not lose sight of the fact that Mr Paisley does not give a fig for the Agreement and when any Executive is finally set up, he will use his power to scupper it completely or rewrite it to something which will be totally unacceptable to Republicans. The Unionists will do what the Unionists have always done when things are not going their way; they will withdraw from government and kill any Executive then in place.If this happens, the repositioning of the Republicans may have pushed the British and Irish Governments to a point where they will have no alternative but to "take on" the Unionist veto.

Those of us who have studied events in that area of the UK over many years will see it for what it is: a repositioning strategy and an attempt by Republicans to force the ball back into the court of Mr Paisley. In other words, it means nothing.GARY DUNIONEDINBURGH The IRA's statement is only the beginning Sir: Having been born and grown up in Belfast through the worst years of violence, excuse me if I don't mirror Tony Blair's enthusiastic reaction to the IRA statement (report, 29 July). Signatories are free to use the US's technology strategies if they wish, or go solar, plant forests, trade capacity with other nations or whatever else they see fit. If the US and Australia had so much faith in the ability of their technology to reduce emissions, they would have no problem signing up to Kyoto.What this new agreement means is that the signatories plan to develop cleaner technologies but take no responsibility whatsoever if those technologies don't work.

Let us without further ado sign up to the only real solution that exists, the "Contraction and Convergence" framework, which guarantees a fair share of emissions to everybody now and in the future.COUNCILLOR RUPERT READ CHIT CHONG GREEN PARTY, LONDON N19Sir: The leaders of the three main UK political parties have agreed on plans to combat terrorism. It seems this was felt to be too important a subject to be undermined by the adversarial politics of Parliament or the unpredictable verdict of the electorate. We need to lead the world toward real measures to cut greenhouse emissions substantially, and soon, if we do not wish to condemn our children to a bleak and terrifying future. Climate change is with us. Sir: What a telling coincidence; Birmingham experiences a tornado on the same day that a hopelessly inadequate scheme to tackle climate change is agreed by the world's worst-polluting countries (Leading article, 29 July) This tornado is a wake-up call for us in Britain. Others are following suit, so let's have more cycle lanes to make it safer for the growing army of cyclists. There are few upsides when a city is deformed by terror, but transforming London into a bigger version of Amsterdam could be one of them Cyclists would be really safe then.

Only those reckless fools who listen to an iPod and carry trendy clothes on the handlebars deserve to remain vulnerable as they get on their bikes once more.s.richards independent.co.uk More from Steve Richards. But at the same time we are informed that there are still deranged killers out and about. Even after the arrests yesterday there are warnings about other cells of potential brainwashed bombers It seems pretty rational to me to avoid the Tube Bugger the experts I am back on the bike. Perhaps if a mad driver had been responsible I would be more wary, but I doubt it.We are told to carry on as normal and are praised for our stoicism. I will not go into detail, but let me just say that it involved listening to an iPod and holding a carrier bag containing some newly purchased trendy clothes on the handlebars Thankfully no cars were involved.