The Sinn Féin president Mr Gerry Adams insisted today there was no reason why the Northern Ireland elections could not be held next month as planned.
He also argued that the IRA had delivered a "hugely advanced package" of intent to end paramilitary activity.
Mr Adams said the British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair's decision to postpone the Assembly elections from May 29th until the autumn was a "slap in the face" of the Belfast Agreement.
Speaking in Westminster today, Mr Adams said: "Mr Blair's decision to stop the elections is a serious mistake. It's as if the rulebook of conflict resolution has been torn up.
"Our view is that Mr Blair should reverse his decision on the elections. That he should enable them to go ahead as soon as possible. In fact there is no reason, and no credible excuse, why there cannot be elections in June."
He also rejected Britain's demand for more clarity from the IRA, arguing it had already made "very significant progress".
"We have an IRA leadership that has stated clearly its willingness to proceedwith the implementation of a process to put arms beyond use at the earliestopportunity."
Mr Adams said the joint declaration by the Irish and British governments was progress, although conditional and protracted.
The SDLP leader Mr Mark Durkan said tonight the elections could go ahead in June. Speaking before a meeting with the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, in Dublin tonight, he argued there should be no "cooling-off period" and that there was no need to wait around.
Everything could be put to the two governments and parties and they could come up with a common response, he claimed.
"That is work that we can do in a matter of days and on the basis of doing that positively we could go forward to elections in June," he said."I want to see both governments clear about the fact that there was no need to postpone the elections."
Earlier today the Northern Secretary Mr Paul Murphy said paramilitary activity was the outstanding issue to be resolved before assembly elections could be held.
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Mr Murphy said that while there has been progress with regard to the IRA he said the central issue still remains one of activity.
Mr Murphy told RTÉ radio this morning: "The question of paramilitary activity, that is to say things like; exiling, so-called punishment beatings, targetting, training, procurement of weapons and surveillance, those issues have not been addressed sufficiently or with enough clarity.
"The issue about the paramilitary activity is one that I think is central to the whole process because, after all, it is that activity which brought down the assembly last year and the fact that we haven't had sufficient clarity to the answers has meant that we are in the position we are in today."
Mr Murphy continued by saying that he regretted the Assembly elections were not held, but "to have an elected assembly which remains suspended because they couldn't actually restore the Executive was a pointless exercise".
"The government's view is that we prefer to go into the next few weeks and months with a realisation that we still have to resolve this issue to get the agreement about the end of paramilitary activity to build up the trust between parties so that we can actually move into an election campaign when we know that at the end of it we will have the institutions restored and the executive restored as well."
The Irish and British governments are expected to set a date for a new series of talks aimed at putting in place reforms to advance the peace process in the absence of the postponed Assembly elections.
This follows a second statement from the IRA last night which was severely critical of both Dublin and London and accused the governments of mischievously leaking and misrepresenting "concepts and drafts" associated with its first statement.
Yesterday the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, confirmed his government's intention to implement changes in policing and criminal justice as well as some reductions in the security presence in the North.
It is expected that Mr Blair will bring forward legislation on independent monitoring and put in place a means of seeing if paramilitary organisations are maintaining their commitments.
