PRESSURE was growing last night for dialogue to continue and to be intensified to agree arrangements in advance for a handful of Orange parades due to take place in the North at the end of the month.
After mediation efforts successfully defused the tense 19-hour stand-off at Bellaghy yesterday morning, calls for talks to ensure calm at the remaining parades came from politicians, community and church leaders.
A series of Royal Black Institution parades is scheduled for the last Saturday in August, some in predominantly Catholic villages which have mounted protests against Orange parades in recent weeks. A further Orange parade is due in Dunloy, Co Antrim, on the second Sunday in September, and the issue of the Apprentice Boys' pledge to complete a walk of Derry's city walls at a time of their choosing remains unresolved.
A question mark hangs over the commitment of some sections of Orange institutions to engage in dialogue with residents' groups.
The Apprentice Boys' leader in Derry, Mr Alistair Simpson, has said he is willing to have further talks with Bogside residents, but not with the Bogside Residents' Group. A Royal Black Institution leader, Mr Robert Overend, has said he is willing to have discussion with "responsible people" in Bellaghy.
Unionist spokesmen and some leaders of the loyal institutions continue to express suspicions that residents' groups had been "taken over" by Sinn Fein. They were also sceptical about nationalist insistence on the principle of "consent" of host communities.
Both sides in the Bellaghy stand-off claimed victory after a deal was reached which allowed the Black chapter to carry out a limited parade in the village's main street yesterday morning.
However, the RUC Deputy Chief Constable, Mr Ronnie Flanagan, who was the principal intermediary, insisted the agreement was "a victory for common sense". A local Sinn Fein councillor, Ms Margaret McKenna, said there must he talks to avoid further confrontation.
Mr Overend claimed the proposal which broke the deadlock had come from the Black Preceptory and said that their agreement had been made with the RUC. Mr Flanagan said that in the fortnight before the next parades he hoped people would "sit down and talk together and come to a locally-agreed accommodation".
In Derry, the Church of Ireland Bishop, Dr James Mehaffey, said: "You must have dialogue with people even the people you resent most, even the people with whom you are in deepest disagreement. You must get into dialogue with them to try and come to an acceptable solution."
Dr Mehaffey said the fact that the Apprentice Boys in the city had been willing to engage in serious conversation was a decided advance. The SDLP leader, Mr John Home, also said the fact that dialogue had taken place would improve the overall atmosphere.