THE Forum for Peace and Reconciliation had "not failed" and was not "dead in the water". It would hold a full session in a fortnight to debate the final paper, its chairwoman, Judge Catherine McGuinness, emphasised.
Its programme of work, including planned publication of three more reports, would continue. "A great deal depends on what progress is made elsewhere", she said.
Her "great hope" was that the present difficulties between the governments and the various parties could be resolved so that all party talks could begin.
Speaking at a press conference yesterday evening in Dublin Castle after the contentious publication of Paths to a Political Settlement, Judge McGuinness rejected suggestions that she was "dressing up" the situation.
"I don't find it a disappointment", she said, identifying the main sticking point for Sinn Fein and the Green Party at the drafting stage as "the issue of ratification of an agreement, once reached".
The forum's prime purpose was not necessarily to achieve agreement between all 12 parties, in her view. The drafting committee had been well aware of the difficulty of the issue for Sinn Fein from the outset last May, she said.
"We are not a negotiating body. Therefore, there are bound to be issues which some parties feel should be reserved for all party talks, if and when they start."
Asked how failure to reach full agreement would be interpreted in unionist political circles, Judge McGuinness said that this was up to the unionist parties to answer.
"But I would ask them, if they were answering it, to look at the large measure of agreement that there was and the usefulness of dialogue ... in getting a full commitment to exclusively peaceful and democratic means of resolving our differences."
She rejected the suggestion that Sinn Fein was among "its own" at the forum and yet had still failed to agree. There had been deep levels of disagreement within the "nationalist family" when the forum was established in October 1994, she stressed. These differences had been reduced significantly.
She did not agree with the claim by the Alliance Party leader, Dr John Alderdice, that the usefulness of the forum was now "dead". There was work on hand which the members wished to complete - a reference to the forthcoming reports on economics, the position of minorities and human rights issues.
"The remit of the forum was to explore issues, to identify difficulties, to try and explore the views of all the parties. Had we been able to reach complete consensus, that would have been a wonderful bonus", Judge McGuinness said.
"I recognised fully that, when it came to the core issues, there was every likelihood that, within the context of the forum's consultative remit, establishing a single common position would be problematic", she said. "Every party had the right, ultimately, to insist that these were more properly matters for a decision in formal, all party talks.
"This eventuality came to pass", she said. ,While there was full agreement in the drafting" committee on all of the text on "realities", and most of the section on "principles and requirements", two parties did not agree on the issue of consent, for quite different reasons.
"I stress that, in respect of all other issues, agreement was reached on a common approach."
The work of the drafting committee was a very valuable "outworking" of the forum's mandate and much common ground had been, established.
"From the outset, there was a full sense that what was being sought was a collective analysis of 12 parties, rather than the imposition on the others of the viewpoint of any one, and there was refreshing absence of partisan point scoring. It has been a deeply instructive educational exercise whose legacy will certainly endure.
"For me, personally, it brought home again, the absolute value of a sustained, systematic process of dialogue.
"The over arching and most important thing is that here we have a document where all these parties are agreeing to an exclusively democratic and peaceful means of resolving their difficulties", she stressed.
"If we can do useful work that can progress the reaching of agreement, we will continue to do so."
The actual process had give her "most delight" in the work of the forum, she said.
There had been no sense of "sniping" at yesterday mornings meeting of the drafting committee, despite publication of the final draft in The Irish Times on Thursday.
Asked if the leak had been an attempt to "sabotage" the document, Judge McGuinness said that such a description would be "to go too far".
"I think that leaks are very unhelpful at all stages", she added.
