SDLP warned over Fianna Fail link

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The SDLP has been warned any formal relationship with Fianna Fail would damage relations with other parties in the Republic of Ireland.

The SDLP has set up a committee to look at its future role.

Enda Kenny, leader of the Republic's opposition Fine Gael party, sounded the warning about a link-up with Bertie Ahern's party.

He said the party could lose all the goodwill and support it has in the Republic if it merged with Fianna Fail.

"The SDLP membership need to know that if they decide to enter into an exclusive or formal relationship with one party, then the SDLP's relationships with the other parties in the south will change very fundamentally.

"Such a move would, I believe, be politically damaging to the SDLP in the long term."

Bertie Ahern announced in September that Fianna Fail would be setting up a committee to look into entering politics north of the border.

The committee is headed by Irish Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern and must report back by next Easter after consulting members across the Republic and nationalists north of the border.

The party's youth wing has formed branches at Queen's University in Belfast and the University of Ulster's Magee campus in Londonderry.

The SDLP, at its party conference earlier this month, also set up a committee to consider its future role in any political realignment on the island of Ireland.

An SDLP spokesman said they were only embarking on a series of engagements and would not jump into any quick fix solutions.

"The party believes that with the bedding down of the Agreement's institutions, new opportunities for new alignments on a series of levels can be achieved," he said.