The British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, and Sinn Féin president Mr Gerry Adams are expected to meet within the next 24 hours amid continuing fallout from the report of the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC).
But while informed sources are agreed that the meeting is potentially fraught, the SDLP has told Mr Blair that Tuesday's publication of the IMC report - implicating Sinn Féin and the Progressive Unionist Party in continuing republican and loyalist paramilitary activities - had "the potential to be a good day for the peace process."
This emerged last night as the Northern Ireland Secretary, Mr Paul Murphy, and the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, announced that the formal review of the Belfast Agreement will be resumed in Belfast next Tuesday, and continued on Tuesday week.
With uncertainty as to which of the Northern Ireland parties would even attend, one talks insider described this as both governments "going through the motions" following the British government's cancellation of next week's planned proximity talks on the initiative of the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern.
However, the SDLP leadership struck a surprisingly upbeat note last night after its meeting with Mr Blair at 10 Downing Street. At the same time Mr Murphy emerged from yesterday's meeting of the British-Irish Inter-Governmental Conference affirming Mr Blair's belief that there would be an opportunity for intensive talks designed to restore devolution in the immediate aftermath of the European elections in June.
And Mr Cowen stressed the need to "make politics work in Northern Ireland", adding that the current review "can be very intensive if the political will can be demonstrated to deal with the issues." Speaking upon his arrival for the meeting in London, Mr Cowen dismissed suggestions that Irish Government criticisms of Sinn Féin were driven by electoral considerations. "It is driven by the evidence we see in the IMC report," he said.
At the same time the Minister stressed the obligation of both governments to pursue the implementation of the agreement and other commitments which were not conditional on actions by others. And he said: "One point I have to make is that I am looking to the IMC coming forward with a report in relation to security and normalisation, what progress has been made with that. These are confidence-building measures required by both communities and secondly, we obviously want to see political dialogue continuing."
SDLP Assembly member Mr Alex Attwood told The Irish Times that Tuesday's publication of the IMC report had "the potential to be a good day for the peace process because, just as [the Cory Report] acknowledged the truth about the past in terms of collusion, so the IMC has acknowledged the truth about paramilitarism in the present." Mr Attwood suggested this provided "a better basis by which we can try to move forward" provided the British government "come up to their own mark" and honour the commitment to a public inquiry into the murder of Mr Pat Finucane and "everybody now holds the line in terms of democratic practice."
Mr Attwood confirmed his party had put detailed proposals to Mr Blair "to take forward the agreement" and said the question of whether the SDLP might resume government without Sinn Féin had not arisen.