The Grand Master of the Orange Order, Mr Robert Saulters, has said he is prepared to meet the former IRA prisoner and spokesman for the Garvaghy Road Residents' Coalition, Mr Breandan Mac Cionnaith, in an attempt to resolve the previously intractable problem of the Drumcree parade.
In a remarkable about-turn yesterday, Mr Saulters announced that he would be putting his proposition - that the order should speak directly to the Garvaghy Road residents - to next Saturday's meeting of the Grand Orange Lodge in Belfast.
The meeting is being held specifically to devise policy on the entire issue of rerouteing parades, and particularly the Drumcree problem, which has led to widespread violence for a fourth consecutive year. This year the violence culminated in the death of the three Quinn children in a loyalist firebomb attack on their home in Ballymoney on July 12th.
Asked yesterday if he would be prepared to speak directly to Mr Mac Cionnaith, who served a jail term for his part in the IRA bombing of the British Legion hall in Portadown, Mr Saulters said: "If it comes down to that, and if we can help the Portadown brethren, I want to do all I can."
However, he pointed out that the prospect of having direct talks - something which both governments have been pursuing without success to date - would rely on the endorsement of the Grand Lodge next Saturday.
Sinn Fein last night welcomed the proposal from Mr Saulters, saying that it suggested "a more realistic attitude by the Orange Order". In a statement last night, the party's Assembly member for North Belfast, Mr Gerry Kelly, said he hoped dialogue would "herald a fresh start for local communities faced by contentious parades and see unionism accept the imperative of inclusive talks".
The core demand of the Garvaghy Road residents over the past few years has been that the Orange Order should talk to them directly about the annual Drumcree parade. The order has repeatedly refused to do so.
Mr Saulters was the main speaker at yesterday's outdoor service in Ballymena, which was attended by about 3,000 Orangemen. He spoke of the need for unity in the order and was given a warm welcome by the crowd. His fellow speaker and former Orange Grand Master, the Rev Martin Smyth, also addressed the gathering on the need for unity and upholding Christian values. He, too, received a warm response.
One of the leading dissident Orange figures in Co Antrim, Mr David Tweed, the former Irish rugby international, acted as a marshal at the service and made no attempt to voice opposition. Asked about Mr Saulters's proposal, Mr Tweed replied: "I have nothing to say at the minute."
The leader of the militant Spirit of Drumcree dissident group, Mr Joel Patton, is on holiday outside Northern Ireland at present. It was not clear yesterday if he intended to return to campaign against Mr Saulters, whom he and his supporters have barracked previously.
Speaking before yesterday's service, which was organised to provide a peaceful outlet to the order's opposition to the blocking of the Drumcree march, Mr Saulters said: "I will be putting this point [about direct talks with the residents' association] to them [the Grand Lodge] and it will be up to Grand Lodge. They are the governing body and they will make the decision on which we will go in the future.
"Looking at it from the long term, in the new Assembly being set up, Sinn Fein could be in a position of being ministers, and through time we will have to talk to them."
Mr Saulters's position is all the more remarkable given that unionist MPs will be attempting again in the House of Commons this week to have Sinn Fein effectively excluded from ministerial positions in the Assembly because of continuing IRA violence and the organisation's failure to decommission its weapons.
Unionists will be pressing the British government to move against Sinn Fein, particularly following the RUC's statement on Friday that the IRA is suspected of having murdered Mr Andy Kearney in Belfast on July 19th. Mr Kearney was shot dead after a dispute with a leading north Belfast IRA figure. Some 30 other people have been wounded by the IRA so far this year in so-called "punishment" attacks.