ALL kinds of sacrifice and compromise - not least the freeing of terrorist killers from jail - have accompanied the Ulster peace process on the tortuous path to its cliffhanging juncture of today.

But, though it may eventually only amount to a footnote in the history of the process, surely, among the most brutal concessions to natural justice that will have had to be borne in order for the process to progress is that now in prospect - the dumping of Mo Mowlam from the post of Northern Ireland Secretary.

Her topping a hitlist of Cabinet reshuffle casualties is an eventuality that is clearly being signalled by detailed leaks and by her own confirmation that she had discussed her "options" with the Prime Minister who, it is said, is frustrated by the poor quality of many of his ministers.

It would, of course, be a cruel calumny for Dr Mowlam to be lumped in with the pile of dead wood to whom Mr Blair is reportedly taking his axe.

For few ministers handed the thorny brief of Ulster can have worked as hard or long for the political settlement that is now teetering on the brink of collapse as Unionist mistrust of the IRA on disarmament proves to be the ominous sticking point.

Her bold, high-risk decision to confront the loyalist paramilitary warlords face-to-face in the Maze Prison in January last year in order to keep the struggling peace process alive stands out as testimony to her determination and effort.

And that disposition has, time and again, been rewarded in opinion polls granting her the status of the most admired member of the Cabinet.

How, then, can Tony Blair we considering shifting her from the Northern Ireland Office - and to where? - at such a crucial stage of the process? We need look no further than the Prime Minister's own ruthless determination to wrest a political settlement out of the miasma of hatred and mistrust in Northern Ireland and see that he considers Dr Mowlam is a sacrifice that must be offered to the Unionists, who have come to regard her as too accommodating of republican demands.

This is evidently being contemplated in the hope of keeping the Unionists to the government's blueprint for Ulster or bringing them back to the talks table later in the summer.

And the timing of the Cabinet shake-up - put off from this week to the middle of the month when, with parliament about to begin its long summer recess, protest at the "sacrifice" of Mo may be swiftly stifled - suggests that her head is being pragmatically offered on a plate to Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble.

Poor Mo. But for all the hard-heartedness and hard-headedness that underlies this strategy, Tony Blair risks a good deal in taking the step, especially if it does not bring the results he seeks.

For whatever new crown he offers his Northern Ireland Secretary, and no matter the goal he seeks, he may be marked as the man prepared to stab the star in his team for the sake of appeasement.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.