Sinn Fein's chief negotiator has accused the Northern Secretary of engaging in a "wrecker's strategy" by demanding an IRA surrender.
Mr Martin McGuinness, writing in Ireland on Sunday, said Dr John Reid had "moved away from the Good Friday agreement and significantly closer to the unionist position" in a very short time.
Mr McGuinness also said recent comments by Dr Reid, about Mr Trimble's ban on Sinn Fein ministers attending North-South ministerial meetings because of the IRA's failure to decommission its weapons, made it appear Dr Reid endorsed Mr Trimble's actions while blaming republicans. "A strategy for blame is a wrecker's strategy," said Mr McGuinness. He accused the Northern Secretary of telling "the Boston Globe that Sinn Fein `still has a gun under the table'. The Globe reporter also said Dr Reid told him the progress of recent years would be lost if the IRA does not surrender its weapons. This open and unapologetic use of a unionist argument and language again sets Dr Reid in behind the Trimble line," he said.
Responding to Mr McGuinness's criticisms yesterday, Dr Reid said he wanted to see the IRA decommission as part of the Belfast Agreement and people could not "demand rights and then say `we don't have responsibilities'."
He said he welcomed the fact that the IRA had not used guns against the security forces in four years and had met the head of the decommissioning body, Gen John de Chastelain. He also recognised that the British government had "a long way to go to fulfil our part of the agreement". It was within this context that he wanted to see more substantial moves towards IRA decommissioning, he said on BBC Radio Four's The Westminster Hour.
Meanwhile, the Alliance Party leader Mr Sean Neeson has accused the Ulster Unionists of wanting his party to "roll over" in discussions on electoral pacts.
"We were trying to reach understandings [with the UUP] where we could maximise the potential for pro-agreement candidates but I regret to say that their view was that we should roll over," Mr Neeson said.
He said the UUP had expected his party to stand aside in all constituencies, something it would not do.