Progress talks on the Belfast Agreement began this morning between the Minister for Foreign Affairs Mr Cowen, the Northern Secretary Dr John Reid and pro-Agreement parties.
It is the first meeting of the Implementation Group which was set up last year after the Weston Park talks to monitor the Agreement's progress.
Due to last an hour, the meeting brings together Ulster Unionists, SDLP, Sinn Fein, the cross-community Alliance Party and the Women's Coalition.
As the parties arrived at Hillsborough Castle, SDLP deputy leader Ms Brid Rodgers welcomed the first meeting of the implementation group, but said her party had four concerns.
After a meeting with the Secretary of State yesterday, she said her party had indicated its concern at the failure to implement the criminal justice review properly.
"We made clear that as a result, we could not support the devolution of justice powers," she said, calling for a new opportunity to review the Criminal Justice Bill.
Mrs Rodgers, who is MLA for Upper Bann and North’s agriculture minister, said the SDLP also wanted further progress on the scaling down of British Army bases and operations in the North.
The SDLP welcomed proposals to open up parliamentary structures in the Republic to politicians elected in the North, but wanted the North-South Parliamentary Forum to be advanced, she said.
She also expressed concerns about plans for an international judge to rule on whether there should be inquiries into a number of controversial killings in Northern Ireland.
Referring to the killings of solicitors Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson and Portadown Catholic Robert Hamill, she said: "We want to ensure that the international judge proposal is got right, so that it does not delay public inquiries."
PA