A level of North-South co-operation "unprecedented since partition" has been achieved following the restoration of the Assembly and the Executive at the end of May, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs.
The North-South dimension of the Belfast Agreement is operating quietly and successfully, with much work of substance being achieved without controversy or dissension, officials at the Department have reported in a very positive progress assessment.
The officials added that Ulster Unionist Ministers felt able to fully participate in the North-South Ministerial Council (NSMC) based on the "overall architecture of the agreement" which also comprised the Executive, the Assembly and the British-Irish Council.
The NSMC and the North-South bodies were the "unsung success" of the Belfast Agreement, they reported.
Since the Executive was restored at the end of May, an intensive series of meetings has been held over a three-week period between Ministers from Dublin and Stormont.
A departmental spokesman said yesterday that the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, was very pleased with the "positive, business-like spirit" in which the meetings of the NSMC had taken place.
"While much of the media focus inevitably has been on the high-profile problems of the process - such as Drumcree and the policing Bill - Mr Cowen said that the feeling in Dublin, and shared in Belfast, is that valuable, solid work has been, and is being, done on the North-South front.
"Mr Cowen said there is appreciation of the positive approach taken by the unionist Ministers, who have made clear that they are happy to work proactively in the NSMC on issues which are of common interest and which bring real mutual benefit in both parts of the island," he said.
Mr Cowen said that unionist Ministers themselves pointed to the "careful checks and balances written into the Belfast Agreement which ensure that all decisions are by agreement and on the basis of mutual consent".
In mid-June and early July Government Ministers, including the Tanaiste, Ms Harney, the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, and the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, met Ulster Unionist, SDLP and Sinn Fein Ministers such as Sir Reg Empey, Mr Sam Foster, Mr Mark Durkan, Ms Brid Rodgers, Mr Martin McGuinness and Ms Bairbre de Brun.
All eight UUP, SDLP and Sinn Fein Ministers attended one or more of the meetings. The DUP boycotted these encounters which dealt with most of the six North-South implementation bodies and the six areas for North-South co-operation.
The officials appeared surprised and gratified that the meetings on issues such as trade, agriculture, health and food safety, EU programmes and waterways had been so harmonious.
"The series of meetings was highly successful. Indeed, the holding of nine ministerial meetings in a period of less than three weeks constitutes an intensity and spread of activity in North-South relations unprecedented since partition," they reported.
"What was perhaps more remarkable was in many ways their very unremarkableness. Because of the requirements of the Good Friday agreement the Northern delegation always comprises an accompanying Minister of the tradition other than the lead Minister," they added.
"Here we had, therefore, without controversy or fuss, a series of nine meetings involving Ministers from the Irish Government sitting down in formal session with delegations comprising UUP, SDLP and Sinn Fein Ministers taking forward co-operation between North and South on a wide range of matters.
"Each meeting was held in a positive, friendly, businesslike spirit with a commitment on all sides to get on with the job in hand."
The Foreign Affairs spokesman added: "Some observers have noted that the unfussy, non-controversial way that North-South business is being done is in itself testimony to the fact that the process, while complex, does work. Indeed, in many ways it is its complexity, with all the checks and balances, which paradoxically allows it to function so effectively."
The second North-South Ministerial Council summit is due late next month in Dublin, to be followed in October by a summit of the British-Irish Council in Dublin.
Meanwhile, senior SDLP politicians continue to warn that any dilution of the Patten proposals on policing could damage the political process. The Deputy First Minister, Mr Seamus Mallon, who yesterday met the Northern Secretary, Mr Peter Mandelson, for more than 90 minutes, said SDLP MPs would monitor the final stages of the police Bill through the British parliament.
He said if the Bill was not significantly amended to meet the concerns of the SDLP "it could have a very serious detrimental effect on the entire political process".
The SDLP chief whip, Mr Eddie McGrady MP, said specifically there must be amendments in relation to the RUC name, the badge and flag, the powers of inquiry of the Policing Board, the role and remit of the Northern Secretary, the Police Ombudsman and the Oversight Commissioner.
