The British and Irish governments will resume talks in London with the Northern parties next week, following yesterday's unsuccessful round of intensive meetings in Downing Street with the Ulster Unionists, Sinn Fein and the SDLP.
The talks failed to achieve a breakthrough on decommissioning and the implementation of the executive.
The Taoiseach, Mr Bertie Ahern, and the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, will meet the parties in London, possibly next Tuesday, while talks between the two governments and the other Northern parties will continue in Belfast this week. Despite the failure of Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists to agree on decommissioning and the establishment of the executive, the two governments made it clear that the Belfast Agreement would not be "parked", and urged both parties to resolve the impasse by working in the coming weeks towards agreeing a compromise.
Meanwhile, the SDLP has challenged both parties to choose between the political process and sticking with absolute positions. Emerging from nearly five hours of talks with each of the parties and Mr Blair, the Taoiseach stressed that the political process was "inclusive" and that no one wanted to see Sinn Fein "left behind" or the process itself break down. Both Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists had to find a way to resolve the impasse and implement the Belfast Agreement, he said.
"We are trying to find a way round or through the impasse that is still there. We did not make any progress on changing that position . . . I don't expect either side to lose all, but neither do I expect them to ask each other to win all . . . if the issue was not absolutely clear on the signing of the Good Friday agreement then we now need to find some way that they can come to an understanding of how the peace process can move on."
Insisting that the process would not be "parked", Downing Street said the prospect of a six-month delay in implementing the Belfast Agreement would be "the enemy of progress", leading to a vacuum. And while no new blueprint for progress had been achieved during the talks with the parties, and conference calls with the other Northern parties, establishing the executive without Sinn Fein would clearly not work because it required cross-community support. Sinn Fein's assessment of the talks was gloomy. The entire party delegation met Mr Blair and Mr Ahern for 45 minutes, and there was a further hour-long discussion between the Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, and its chief negotiator, Mr Martin McGuinness, and the two leaders. Afterwards Sinn Fein said the Belfast Agreement was in "free fall".
The party chairman, Mr Mitchell McLaughlin, said the problems of implementing the Belfast Agreement remained and were a matter of considerable concern. "We certainly don't see any basis for being confident that the government are going to establish political institutions. Our view that the Good Friday agreement is in free fall remains. "Both governments have actually moved off the Good Friday agreement onto the territory defined by the Unionist Party and clearly that has been a huge mistake. Clearly the governments have recognised that the Hills borough Declaration is now a dead duck."
While Sinn Fein declared that the peace process was in "decline", the Ulster Unionist leader, Mr David Trimble, rejected that view and insisted the peace process was not close to collapse. However, he said Sinn Fein must address its obligations in word and deed and he urged loyalist paramilitaries to move on decommissioning in order to "isolate" elements within republicanism who were unable to move forward. After an hour of talks with the two governments, Mr Trimble said the talking would continue. "I am quite sure that the process is not in free fall and is not going to be in free fall. This process is much more robust than that. I don't think it is helpful to suggest that this process is close to collapse."
Clearly frustrated by the lack of progress, the Deputy First Minister, Mr Seamus Mallon, said the Belfast Agreement was being "held to ransom" by Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists. The SDLP had put forward suggestions to resolve the impasse to the two governments and all the parties during an hour of talks. Stating that the two parties faced a choice between "a political process, and each of them holding onto either the preconditions or their refusal to move on decommissioning", Mr Mallon said there was "no stomach left" for allowing absolute positions to block the implementation of the Belfast Agreement. "That is where we're at. That we have either a choice - those two parties especially - between a continuing political process and the full implementation of the Good Friday agreement, or they hold on, either to their position on decommissioning or their precondition."
Asked whether Sinn Fein should be left behind if the deadlock was not resolved, Mr Mallon said: "I think it is time for everybody, actually, to properly get on the train, not to be leaving people behind. This is an inclusive agreement and what is happening is people are staying off the train rather than getting on it."
The Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, said the crux over decommissioning should not surprise Sinn Fein, "given the fact that they committed themselves to deal with it at the outset of the negotiations, and plainly they have not been able to deliver any significant progress on the commitments they made then".
Mr Bruton said Mr Adams was reported as saying that the Belfast Agreement was "dead" if the British and Irish governments continued to insist on some prior IRA decommissioning before the formation of an executive. He said he was surprised Sinn Fein had not come forward with constructive proposals to solve "this entirely predictable decommissioning/distrust problem".
"They know well that decommissioning is an issue because the IRA has failed to convince the other participants to the talks that they do not still retain the option of using violence again." Sinn Fein specifically committed themselves to progress on decommissioning when they accepted the Mitchell principles, in a resolution passed at the outset of the negotiations and in their adherence to the Belfast Agreement, he added.