Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists were told this evening to stop playing the blame game over the crisis in the Northern Ireland political process and to face up to their responsibilities to get devolution restored.
Mr Sean Farren, the SDLP Finance Minister at Stormont before the suspension, told the two sides to stop the posturing.
"The public is sick and tired of finger pointing politics. The blame game must end and parties must face their responsibilities," he said today. Failure to act would mean public confidence in the political process would be neither maintained or strengthened, he said.
"Sinn Fein never ceases to point fingers at the UUP and the British government blaming each in turn for the assembly's suspension. Unionists blame Sinn Fein and the IRA with similar accusations and then blame each other," Mr Farren added.
For Sinn Fein to say the IRA is not ready for further acts of decommissioning because of what the British government had not yet done, or because loyalists haven't moved, or because unionists were not 100 per cent for the agreement, was to avoid their own responsibilities , he said.
"While there is much the British must do, it is dishonest not to acknowledge that some military installations have been demolished, that some security sites are to be transferred for community use and that some progress is being made on human rights, equality, and reform of criminal justice."
The Ulster Unionist Party had yet to show it is wholeheartedly behind the Belfast Agreement, said Mr Farren.
"It cannot continue with a large section ambivalent and others hostile to the agreement. There must be a clear signal that it will operate all aspects of the agreement and that attempts to frustrate its pro-agreement section will cease."
The "window of opportunity" for a resolution before the currently scheduled May elections was closing fast, said Mr Farren. "Discussions this week will show whether the will to face up to and to act on those responsibilities exists."