NEXT Sunday's planned Orange parade at Drumcree is expected to top the agenda at the Taoiseach's first meeting with the British Prime Minister in London this afternoon. However, Government sources signalled last night that Mr Ahern did not expect to be informed of Mr Blair's decision about the routing of the Orange march at today's meeting.
The prospects for a restoration of an IRA ceasefire and the whole peace process will also be discussed in some detail at the first formal meeting between the two government leaders since their respective general elections.
The former rainbow coalition government's assessment of the events of Bloody Sunday and the joint paper on decommissioning will also be raised, and a Government spokesman indicated that some EU matters may be discussed, as well as the British government's recent admission that radioactive materials were dumped in the Irish Sea.
Mr Ahern is due to meet Mr Blair at 3 p.m. at 1O Downing Street for an hour and a half. It is understood there will not be a joint press conference afterwards.
The tension surrounding Sunday's proposed Orange parade through the Catholic Garvaghy Road area of Portadown has increased with a threat by an extreme loyalist group to carry out assassinations if the parade is stopped.
The threat came as the latest attempts to negotiate a settlement of the parade issue failed. Talks at Stormont between the Garvaghy Road Residents Coalition and the Secretary of State, Dr Mo Mowlam, broke up after an hour and a half yesterday without agreement being reached. Ms Mowlam had similarly unsuccessful talks with the Orange Order on Tuesday night.
The group which issued the threat in a statement directed at the Government is the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF), the same group which killed a Catholic taxi driver, Michael McGoldrick, during last year's standoff at Garvaghy Road.
The statement was immediately condemned by Mr Gary McMichael, leader of the Ulster Democratic Party, the political wing of the loyalist paramilitary organisation, the Ulster Defence Association.
Mr McMichael called on the LVF to lift the threat, saying "We have a very delicate situation in trying to resolve the Drumcree parade issue. The Orange Order have made reasonable and sensible plans on how to deal with this matter. It is counter-productive for the LVF to behave in such a way.
After yesterday's talks at Stormont, the Garvaghy Road residents revealed that the RUC had refused permission for a community festival to be held on the road at the time the Orange parade is due to pass.
Dr Mowlam said she accepted that the police had made the order in the interests of preventing an obstruction.
Last night the coalition began nightly vigils on the Garvaghy Road to ensure that no parade passes down the road before the proposed Sunday parade.
In a statement yesterday, the Orange Order said the Garvaghy coalition was showing its "penchant for intimidation and threats" and was being manipulated by "Sinn Fein/IRA". It added: "The hand of Sinn Fein/IRA is to be clearly seen in the orchestration of the campaign against peaceful, legitimate expressions or our faith and culture."
Sinn Fein yesterday indicated that it would view any decision by the British government to allow the Orange parade along Garvaghy Road as a capitulation.