Speaking in a Senate debate Micheál Martin, Minister for External Affairs, has spoken about the deadlock surrounding the transfer of Policing & Justice powers to the Northern assembly. Echoing Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams' stance, Martin said that a solution to the issue of contentious parades could not be a prerequisite for the completion of devolution.

Writing in the latest edition of An Phoblacht Sinn Féin chair Declan Kearney has accused both the DUP and the British government of engaging in 'brinkmanship' over the issue. He described as 'mistaken' any assumption that Sinn Féin was so committed to Stormont that it lacked effective political leverage and warned that the current impasse had the potential for 'complete free-fall'. Party colleague Gerry Kelly later played down Kearney's comments, saying that they were symptomatic of frustration within Sinn Féin over the DUP's approach to power-sharing.

Meanwhile the Alliance Party, which stands to acquire the Justice Ministry if and when powers are devolved, appears to have raised a preconditon of its own. South Belfast MLA Anna Losaid that the party would not accept the ministry unless Sinn Féin and the DUP agreed a 'Shared Future' strategy to address the thorny issue of segregation, which her party claims costs the taxpayer £1 billion annually.

Early election anyone?

Update:
Micheál Martin met NI Secretary Shaun Woodward in London yesterday to discuss the current crisis.

More on the possibility of spring Stormont election

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Peter Robinson has said that negotiations on the devolution of Policing & Justice would come to a halt if Sinn Féin resorts to 'blackmail'. Referring to the comments of SF chair Declan Kearney (see above) Robinson said that the DUP would not yield to 'threats'.

There was silly old me thinking that the P & J negotiations had culminated with a £1 billion offer from Gordon Brown and that the DUP had subsequently welched on the deal.

Anyone willing to bet against an Assembly election in the spring?

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Blackmail, now there's a nasty word to throw around if you dont want the attention on yourself.

What have SF threatened the nutters with, counselling?

The DUP have been bribing Gordon Brown, and theyve been caught.
They already got a dirty back hand lump sum for their 99% Protestant part time 'police' force and theyre looking to get rid of the parades commission as well.
This is an obvious blackmail by the DUP, so obvious they feel the need to shout blackmail at SF before people start pointing the finger at themselves.

They're scared stiff to devolve anymore power from their 'motherland' incase we get a small modern dose of democracy up here and scare away their Ballymena Bible belt vote.

SF obviously just want the policing powers devolved, and the DUP have been holding it back for a long time - even when they were told it was hampering U.S. investment.

They need a auld good toe up the arse insetad of people treating them with any sort of respect.

They feel threatened by SF and co. who seek modernisation and to move forward.
Any change will fell like blackmail, threats etc. to the DUP , an old fashioned deeply racist/sectarian/homophobic/religious party which has to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world and has the nerve to complain about it.

Blackmail, lol!
Dont make me laugh.

This threat of the Alliance Party concerning a 'Shared Future' strategy is most irritating: people intuitively understand what this means. However, most people are actually happy with 'segregation'. In fact, if anything, people want more 'segregation'. Ballymena has a communal sports complex and swimming pool. It's effectively off-limits to the town's Catholics. It always was and currently is (my friends bemoaned the fact that S.F. wouldn't accept the P.S.N.I. and confidently predicted vandalism and violence against Catholic or Nationalist property and persons, respectively, would miraculously cease upon joining the policing boards. He can't acknowledge that this strategy has been a complete failure). This social amenities will always be off-limits to Catholics, at least in vicious hell holes like Ballymena. That's why Catholics don't want a 'shared future'; they want their own sports complex/swimming pool.

Bring on an election, which will likely result in an end to sectarian unionist majoritarianism for all time.
Unionists currently hold 55 of the 108 Assembly seats, a majority of one. Nationalist gains would ensure that is no longer the case.

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What did Kearney expect? Did the shinners really believe that the Brits were 'honest brokers' when everyone knows they are as honest as Gerry Adams. PSF's commitment to Stormont is enshrined in their paychecks so they aren't going away you know.

The DUP couldnt have put it better!

An election appears to makes sense from the point of view of both SF and the DUP.

Robinson has been playing hardball - so far successfully. That should help him to see off the threat from Jim Allister and his unknowns (though Allister must be in with a reasonable shout for a Westminster seat)

Meanwhile Sinn Féin have fulfilled their side of the bargain. They would go into an election with the righteous conviction of the aggrieved party, figuring that grassroots anger over unionist bad faith would counteract lingering doubts over long-term strategy.

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Don't be a complete muppet, the profiteers of the DUP are hardly going to draw attention to the realities of the corrupt pantomime that they are performing with PSF; much better to rile up the plebs and keep their attention diverted.

And you honestly think such a situation can continue indefinitely?

Sooner or later both halves of the community will either have to intergrate or one side will "ethnically cleanse" the other away (and the Brits did actually consider murdering and driving away all nationalists at the beginning of the troubles...nice guys who are so nuetral in all this ).

The Provos decomissioning has left the Nationalist community largely defenseless. Given the continuing situation in the six counties do PSF supporters really believe that that was prudent?

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"Among the political attitudes that prevail in Germany today, only socialism has the potentiality of inner value and integrity. That is how we Germans are; we cannot possibly be like the English, we can only be caricatures of them—and that we have been often enough. Every man for himself: that is an English idea. Every man for every other man: that is the Prussian way."

Oswald Spenglar.