LONDON (Reuters) - A spokesman for British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Sunday denied reports that Blair had face-to-face talks with senior members of the Irish Republican Army during peace talks last month in Belfast. „All the prime minister‘s contacts with the Republican movement have been through Sinn Fein,“ the spokesman told Reuters. The Independent on Sunday newspaper said three members of the guerrilla group‘s army council offered at the secret meeting to give up all weapons by May 2000. The newspaper said the IRA had passed information through Blair because it was politically impossible for them to speak directly to the Unionists. Blair and his Irish counterpart Bertie Ahern spent five days in Belfast at the beginning of July, locked in marathon talks with the pro-British Unionists and the IRA‘s political ally Sinn Fein. Talks centred on Unionist demands that the IRA and Sinn Fein give a clear commitment to disarm before Sinn Fein could take its seats in a power-sharing assembly for the province. After the Belfast meeting, Blair said there had been „historic, seismic shifts in the political landscape of Northern Ireland,“ the Independent said. The peace process has since stalled and is pending a review in September.