THE NORTH-SOUTH Ministerial Council meeting scheduled for today in Armagh was cancelled yesterday after Sinn Féin again blocked a meeting of the Northern Executive that was listed for yesterday afternoon.
The next Executive is due to take place in two week's time, but it remains uncertain whether it will convene. If it doesn't go ahead it will mean that Northern Ministers have not acted in collective session for four months.
The British and Irish governments continue to stand aside from the standoff between Sinn Féin and the DUP over the transfer of policing and justice powers, arguing that it is up to these two to resolves their differences.
In the meantime, there are no indications that either Sinn Féin is prepared to end its veto on holding Executive meetings, or that the DUP will provide a timeframe for devolving policing and justice powers as Sinn Féin is demanding as a quid pro quo for allowing the Executive to meet. The sides have pledged to continue talking in the coming two weeks.
The British-Irish council meeting went ahead in Edinburgh last Friday after Sinn Féin and the DUP agreed to trigger the "urgent procedure" mechanism to allow it proceed. This is a system where Ministers can exchange correspondence to permit such meetings. However, when Sinn Féin Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness refused to allow yesterday's Executive meeting, the DUP in turn said today's council meeting could not take place.
Sinn Féin Regional Development Minister Conor Murphy said the ministerial council meeting should have taken place. Blocking it, he added, raised "very serious questions about the DUP commitment to working these institutions and underlines the fact that the current impasse is not about whether the Executive meets but about the commitment of the DUP to partnership and equality".
DUP Minister for Finance Nigel Dodds rejected the Sinn Féin argument. "It is a legal requirement and prerequisite for a North-South Ministerial Council meeting to take place that the papers are approved by the Northern Ireland Executive," he said.
"In light of the fact that there was an Executive meeting scheduled for for which the Deputy First Minister refused to agree an agenda, it would not be appropriate to seek to approve the papers by way of urgent procedure. In short, there was no need for the urgent procedure."
Taoiseach Brian Cowen said the Government was disappointed the Executive had not met yesterday and that this had led to the postponement of today's meeting.