The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Mr Peter Mandelson, says he is getting "impatient" with the political parties waiting for someone else to move to resolve the decommissioning impasse.
At a press conference in the British embassy before he went to the White House, Mr Mandelson said he was not prepared "to wait indefinitely" for the parties to move. May 22nd was still a deadline for decommissioning even if prospects for complete disarmament were "poor".
"Some in Sinn Fein seem to be saying that decommissioning does not matter, that the May 22nd deadline is gone, and nobody needs to talk about what to put in its place." But Mr Mandelson warned that that was "a step back from the Good Friday agreement and a step back from the sort of realism and commitment to negotiate that we need and expect from Sinn Fein".
Referring to an article in The Irish Times yesterday in which Mr Gerry Kelly of Sinn Fein cast doubt on the de Chastelain decommissioning body, Mr Mandelson said that such a stance, if sustained, would be "a disavowal" of the agreement.
"We should not forget about decommissioning as Gerry Adams seemed to be suggesting yesterday, nor does it mean that this is the end of the Good Friday agreement. Both of these conclusions are wrong. Decommissioning will not go away. It is an essential part of the peace process."
Earlier in his introductory remarks, Mr Mandelson insisted that the show was "back on the road", citing good meetings with the parties so far. "Brian Cowen and I will discuss the next steps here in Washington tomorrow. Next week the two prime ministers will meet in Lisbon."
But he warned that "the coming weeks will demand more courage and more compromise".
On the security front, Mr Mandelson said that "for the first time since 1969 there will be no army battalion resident in Belfast" and this was an indication of how much progress had been made in establishing peace since the agreement two years ago.
He said that "dissidents still pose a threat" and the arrests on Wednesday night near Hillsborough "preventing another potential atrocity are only the latest example".
He said that the terms of licensing and release of one of those arrested would be looked at "very closely."
Mr Mandelson concluded with a strong appeal to the IRA. "Don't break off your dialogue with the de Chastelain commission . . . Don't take what you have said away, don't take the proposals you floated off the table because that's going to help nobody."
He appealed to all the parties to stop name-calling and the blame game and to get back to serious talks "so that all of us together can get this show back on the road, once and for all".