Plans to restore power sharing to Northern Ireland's political parties received a setback today when a face-to-face meeting involving the Rev Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams was called off.
Northern Secretary Peter Hain stepped in to postpone talks at Stormont following a row over whether Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness would swear an oath to support the police and rule of law.
A Programme for Government meeting involving all sides in Belfast had been planned for this afternoon following last week's political breakthrough at St Andrews, in Scotland.
Part of the process negotiated by the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and Prime Minister Tony Blair would have meant DUP leader Mr Paisley and Mid Ulster MP and Sinn Féin chief negotiator Mr McGuinness being installed as the First and Deputy First Minister on November 24th.
Northern Secretary Peter Hain
Today's meeting would have been the first time Mr Paisley and Sinn Féin president Mr Adams sat across the table from each other. But when it became clear the DUP was unhappy with what they claimed to be an unresolved issue of Mr McGuinness swearing an oath of support for the police, the discussions were postponed.
Northern Secretary Peter Hain attempted to play down the dispute, describing it as a glitch. "We've hit a bit of a glitch today. I think there will be more before we have an agreement that finally goes into legislation and we get the institutions up and running," he said.
"I'm not bothered about it. I expected something like this to happen. The two building blocks of the St Andrews Agreement stand or fall together, power-sharing on the one hand, support for policing and the rule of law on the other, as I told the House of Commons yesterday. That remains in place.
"I'm confident that the St Andrews Agreement central architecture will be delivered and restoration (of devolution) will happen."
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern told the Dáil : "I do not believe we should get too excited about the developments on this issue."
Mr Adams was also measured in his response, expressing disappointment that today's meeting did not go ahead.
The West Belfast MP said he believed Mr Paisley was committed to doing a deal. "I take people at their word and I listened very intently to what Ian Paisley said at the close of the St Andrews talks," Mr Adams said. "I think particularly the words at the end of his remarks were spoken in a very genuine way."
Mr Hain's decision came after crisis talks with the Democratic Unionists at Stormont. Earlier Mr Paisley pulled out of the meeting, which would have seen Sinn Féin and other parties embark with the DUP on consultations on policy objectives for a future power sharing executive.
Mr Paisley told reporters: "We are in this fight to win for Ulster and democracy and to keep the British government to the promises they made. "None of these promises are verbal. They are promises which are written down. "They know if they don't keep them, these writings will be taken out and pushed down their throats publicly."
British and Irish government officials regarded today's meeting as an important step in the carefully-crafted choreography mapped out by Mr Ahern and Mr Blair at St Andrews towards power sharing next March.
The dispute over whether Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander will take a ministerial pledge to support the Police Service of Northern Ireland and uphold the rule of the law also threatened to set back plans for the nomination of Mr Paisley and the Sinn Féin MP as Stormont's First and Deputy First Ministers.