Northern Ireland secretary Dr John Reid will this afternoon announce how the British government will respond to the IRA's historic decision to disarm.

A series of security installations in south Armagh are likely to be taken apart and troops Reid is expected to give details of when British troops will begin to be pulled out.

"By improving the whole situation it enables me to take immediate steps and measures and to look forward to try and normalise Northern Ireland society and carry forward the pledges that we have made in the Belfast Agreement," said Dr Reid.

"But most importantly it enables us to get stability to the executive and the assembly because that is the bedrock of the future - local politicians from both sides of the community making decisions about Northern Ireland."

Sinn Fein said there was now no reason for any of the other parties in the Northern Ireland peace process to drag their feet.

Party chairman Mitchel McLaughlin said there was now "forward momentum" that would eventually lead to full disarmament.

"I think it will probably take some time, but at least we have forward momentum. There are mechanisms that we carefully thought about, negotiated out. The object of the exercise is to make it possible for us to achieve total decommissioning, to get all of the weapons out of circulation," he said.

"We have to be very, very careful about the dynamics that exist within both the loyalist and the republican community on this very, very delicate and complex matter. We have a mechanism for doing it, and it obviously works."