The Taoiseach has said talks between the parties in the North cannot continue beyond November 25th. If no deal is agreed by then, the Irish and British governments will present a joint proposal for implementing the Belfast Agreement, writes Denis Staunton in Rome
"We have a number of options, a number of scenarios which we'll decide on then," he said.
Mr Ahern was speaking in Rome, where he discussed the North with the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, in the margins of a ceremony to sign the EU's constitutional treaty.
He said he and Mr Blair agreed that the first anniversary of last November's Assembly elections was the deadline for the end of the current round of talks and there was no question of prolonging the process until after next year's British general election.
"We are not going to wait until after the election," Mr Ahern said. "There are some who would think that they can play this out and that nothing will happen this side of the election but we're not going to go down that road."
The Taoiseach said both governments were committed to the Belfast Agreement and their "co-partnership" of the process. There was no possibility of a return to "majoritarianism" and it was important that DUP members understood that.
"The Good Friday agreement is an indispensable reality and it's the basis on which the divided nature of Northern Ireland's society is going to be addressed. If there's to be any progress, it's going to be on that basis. It also makes good sense for the island as a whole that we go forward on the basis of partnership and that's why the North-South mechanisms of the agreement are so important and need to have strength. We're not going to dilute any of them to suit anybody."
Mr Ahern praised the "helpful and constructive" approach of the DUP leader, Dr Ian Paisley, and said the Government valued its "very positive relationship" with the party.
"I understand the problem of the DUP, that they're late into the process of negotiation and they are later still into the process of compromise, but this is what it's about," he said. "It will only work if people make compromises and the Good Friday agreement is the foundation on which all these relationships can be further built and strengthened."
Mr Ahern said negotiations over the last two weeks had not been good and that no progress was likely next week because a number of the key interlocutors would be unavailable. This left only a few weeks before the November 25th deadline, after which the two governments were determined to launch a new phase.
"People have to understand that the governments are together, the governments are moving on and they have to move. The option that a party - or two parties - can just decide the agenda totally and that nothing happens is not going to work. We've been at this since the review started in January and we always said we'd stick at it through the year but we have to come to conclusions now."
Mr Ahern said he believed some in the DUP wanted to negotiate a deal now, others wanted to wait until after the British elections and a third group did not want to negotiate at all.
The governments were determined to stick to a common strategy as soon as the November 25th deadline passed. "We're going to stick to a strategy," he said. "If we can't complete this phase, then we'll go on another phase, which we'll have to work out, but it will be on the basis of co-partnership. There won't be any divergence."