The Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister will hold talks today in London aimed at restoring devolution in Northern Ireland.
Mr Blair and Mr Ahern were expected to use today's meetings with the Stormont Assembly parties to assess the state of the peace process.
However, with unionists and republicans deadlocked over the issue of paramilitary activity, it was widely believed that a more intensive push to resolve the impasse would have to take place either later this summer or in the autumn.
The two prime ministers were due to meet the Rev Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists first in London.
Mr Paisley's party is the largest in Northern Ireland and has been adamant that the IRA has to wind down if they are ever to share power with Sinn Féin in a devolved government.
Sinn Féin has insisted that there needs to be guarantees from the two governments that they will implement pledges made last year in talks and that unionists must also assure them that they will approach any power sharing government in good faith.
Mr Blair and Mr Ahern were due to meet a Sinn Féin delegation led by Mr Gerry Adams and including Mr Martin McGuinness and the party's two MEPs, Ms Bairbre de Brún and Ms Mary Lou McDonald.
The leader of the nationalist SDLP, Mr Mark Durkan, said the DUP and Sinn Féin were guilty of intransigence and playing games with the peace process.