BELFAST - David Trimble, who last week resigned as First Minister of the power-sharing Administration in Northern Ireland, this week will seek re-selection for the post after winning the backing of his Ulster Unionist Party.
The party's ruling council supported his acceptance that the IRA had begun todecommission its weapons and therefore a return to the Executive with Sinn Fein, the IRA's political wing, was justified.
His resignation gamble could have collapsed the Stormont Assembly.
Trimble, who seemed bouncily cheerful yesterday, has to win a majority of Unionist support in the Assembly to resume his job as First Minister, a task made less easy by the opposition of the Rev Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists and the wavering loyalty of one Unionist assembly member, Peter Weir, still undecided after the Unionist council meeting.
Trimble's own future is by no means secure. If he fails to win support within the Stormont Assembly, the Good Friday Agreement, of which he is an architect, will be over.
