Senior Ulster Unionist negotiator Sir Reg Empey has warned the British government against capitulating to nationalist demands on the Patten Report on policing.
Sir Reg said his party's concerns over the report must be met if a crisis was to be avoided. "The protection of the RUC and its effectiveness as a police force is critical if confidence in the current process is to be sustained.
"The government must recognise that the Patten Commission breached the terms of reference given to it by the Belfast Agreement." Sir Reg said the Patten Report did not command widespread support in the North.
"The government must address the concerns of the unionist community. The Patten Commission envisaged a peaceful background for the implementation of its proposals. This has not occurred. Only when this happens will people accept the need for changes to policing in Northern Ireland."
Meanwhile, the chairman of the Young Unionist Council, Dr Philip Weir, has said it is now obvious the Provisional IRA would not disarm of its own free will and needed "an incentive" to do so.
"Northern Ireland will never have peace without paramilitary disarmament and disarmament will not occur without unionist hard-balling. Republicans can have their ministries after disarmament but no guns will mean no government."