The Sinn Féin leadership is prepared to call a special ardfheis in January to change its policy on policing in Northern Ireland, The Irish Timeshas been told.
However, the party insists there will be no special conference without prior agreement with the DUP on a timetable for the devolution of policing and justice powers to Stormont.
Senior Sinn Féin sources confirmed at the weekend that the special ardfheis would be necessary to permit Martin McGuinness to accept his nomination as co-equal deputy first minister in the power-sharing Executive scheduled to be appointed on March 26th.
They also say the DUP would be entitled to regard the new pledge of office, enshrined in last week's emergency British legislation, as amounting to an explicit endorsement of the PSNI.
The sources reiterated however that Gerry Adams would not move to call an ardfheis without DUP agreement on the modality of a new policing and justice ministry at Stormont, the timetable for the transfer of powers and a resolution with the British government of the vexed question of MI5 involvement with the PSNI.
The signs also are that without prior agreement with the DUP to form a government on March 26th, Sinn Féin leaders are likely to join a growing number of politicians on all sides questioning why the planned Assembly elections should proceed.
In the House of Commons last week, SDLP leader Mark Durkan said Northern secretary Peter Hain risked a "crazy position" in which voters were asked to "endorse a deal" that had not been done. DUP chief whip Nigel Dodds said: "Some people might wonder in those circumstances whether an election will advance anything."
Mr Dodds was one of the 12 dissenting DUP Assembly members overruled on Friday when party leader Ian Paisley issued the second crucial statement required by the British and Irish governments confirming that - provided his terms on policing and other outstanding issues were met - he would accept nomination as first minister.
On Friday night, leadership sources suggested that the dissenting statement had been intended as an agreed challenge to speaker Eileen Bell's interpretation of Dr Paisley's first statement during the formal sitting of the transitional Assembly.
However, The Irish Timeshas established that a number of the 12 subsequently given a dressing-down by the leadership did not know in advance of the second Paisley statement regarded by Downing Street as justification of prime minister Tony Blair's decision to allow the process to continue.
Mr Hain attempted to keep the pressure on Mr Dodds in particular yesterday, demanding that some "leading figures" in the DUP - not Ian Paisley or Peter Robinson - "should stop saying they will never accept devolution [ of policing powers] in their political lifetime".
Mr Robinson has pointed out that he used the offending words before Mr Dodds.
He was at one with his colleague in the Commons last week in telling MPs that a timetable for the devolution of policing powers was not a condition of the St Andrews Agreement.