Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain appears to have laid the basis for a future showdown with the DUP over the conditions for a return to power-sharing government at Stormont.
In his most explicit terms yet in the Commons, Mr Hain yesterday told Ian Paisley that the DUP would have to talk to Sinn Féin "sooner rather than later". He flatly rejected Dr Paisley's suggestion that he should exclude Sinn Féin from a future devolved government.
Officials had "flagged-up" Mr Hain's intended answer in advance, signalling his assertion that "this year will be decisive" was intended as something more than a restatement of previous warnings that "the current impasse cannot and will not continue".
When asked specifically to name the biggest single impediment to restoring devolution, Mr Hain cited the absence of agreement between the parties, warning the political leaders that "they will face a hard choice later this year if they do not make that agreement."
While security minister Shaun Woodward said London had "no reason to doubt" the IRA intended to honour its undertakings, Mr Hain also told Dr Paisley that Sinn Féin had committed itself to the democratic, peaceful and political path "for many years" before last July's IRA statement formally ending its armed campaign.
Senior Whitehall sources later told The Irish Times that this did not mean London was yet satisfied the conditions existed for the immediate reinstatement of a powersharing Executive.
However, while acknowledging the January report from the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC), which linked the IRA to ongoing criminality and intelligence gathering, the sources quoted last week's IMC assertion that the IRA "no longer poses a terrorist threat" as evidence that they were "getting closer to the criteria". That reinforced the impression among some observers that "the hard choice" Mr Hain had in mind would really be for Dr Paisley, should the British later this year decide the criteria for the resumption of powersharing had been met.
Dr Paisley challenged Mr Hain to "face up to the issue that there is one party that will not agree the so-called basis of the [ Belfast] agreement, that we all should be democrats" and to exclude Sinn Féin because republicans "have not kept to that way". The decision for Mr Hain, said Dr Paisley, was whether "those that would agree with terrorism . . . can be in government".
However, Mr Hain replied: "If he's saying to me that Sinn Féin have not committed themselves following the IRA statement, and indeed, to be fair to them, for many years before, to the democratic, peaceful and political path - if he's saying that then I don't think he's actually judging the evidence that has been presented to us."
Mr Hain continued: "If he [ Dr Paisley] is also asking me to bar a very important part of the Northern Ireland political constituency from representation in the Assembly or a power-sharing government, then I can't agree with him on that."