The Taoiseach has warned of a "total mess" if agreement among the Northern parties and the two governments is not finalised.
Mr Ahern's assessment, which he said was supported by Mr Tony Blair, came as the Sinn Féin president, Mr Gerry Adams, warned that unionists and the two governments were "setting the bar too high".
The charge has been rejected by Ulster Unionist leader Mr David Trimble. He was speaking after the seventh meeting between Sinn Féin and the UUP.
Mr Ahern told the Dáil yesterday: "We have not as yet got to a position where we have the basis of an agreement where we can say that we can move into elections positively.
"The difficulty is if we don't approve this in the next period of time we could get into an election situation that would just lead to no progress and everybody fighting the elections on a negative position.
"The chances if that happens of finding a workable executive . . . and to then move forward a programme for government in a positive frame of mind would be in my view, and in the view of Prime Minister Blair, and all the other people involved on the pro-agreement side, would be a total mess."
Mr Adams said the political process would be in deep trouble if a way out of the impasse was not found. He said the UUP position did not add up: "The Ulster Unionist Party wants to see the IRA go away, and Sinn Féin's peace strategy is to achieve that objective, but at the same time as they want that, they are against the British army going away. I've said to unionists, it doesn't make sense." He criticised positions adopted by the Ulster Unionist executive at its meeting last week. "I have looked at the UUP position last Friday and I see the rejection of element after element after element of aspects of the Good Friday agreement."
However, Mr Trimble said the demands were not his, but those of the two governments. He accused republicans of failing in their duties under the Belfast Agreement: "That agreement talked about decommissioning being completed within two years, it's now five years . . . about being committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means, which necessarily means no paramilitary organisations."