The Government will continue to hold bilateral meetings with Sinn Fein ministers who have been prevented from meeting under the umbrella of the North-South Ministerial Council.
At a meeting of the council dealing with the cross-Border Special European Projects Board in Omagh yesterday, the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, would not be drawn on whether unionists should reverse their position. He would only say "the wider political issues will be the subject of intense political debate". This should be done "with a view to having them resolved as soon as possible". Mr McCreevy met the SDLP Minister of Finance, Mr Mark Durkan, and the junior UUP Minister, Mr Dermot Nesbitt.
Mr Nesbitt said he had taken note of Mr McCreevy's comment but said the demand for republicans to re-engage in the decommissioning process was fair. He also referred to Ms Liz O'Donnell's statement last weekend that the people of Northern Ireland would not be asked to do that which would not be done in the South.
The meeting discussed projects worth more than £1.3 billion. Mr Durkan said it exemplified the potential of cross-Border bodies. "The North-South Ministerial Council is important to the agreement and we want to see it and the other institutions succeed," he said.
He also said bilateral meetings took place not only as an alternative to North-South Ministerial Council meetings, "they take place on many levels and are normal, appropriate and healthy". Mr Durkan responded to the warning by the DUP's Minister of Regional Development, Mr Gregory Campbell, that certain road projects would not go ahead unless his department was given an additional £80 million. It was the responsibility of ministers to give priority to projects within their own budgets, Mr Durkan said.