Northern Ireland parties given 48-hour deadline to to reach power-sharing deal

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and his Irish counterpart Brian Cowen insisted after the talks broke up on Wednesday that "progress" had been made and there was scope for an agreement.

The row over policing and justice powers is critical to the future of the province's power-sharing government of Protestants and Catholics, and failure to reach agreement could cause the administration to collapse.

But Brown warned that if the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and Sinn Fein fail to hammer out a deal within 48 hours, London and Dublin would publish their own plans to move the process forward.

"We believe we have proposals that make for a reasonable deal on devolution of policing and justice, we believe we have proposals that make for a reasonable settlement on all the outstanding issues," Brown said.

He cautioned however, in regard to the 48-hour deadline: "If we judge that insubstantial progress has been made we will publish our own proposals."

Brown stressed that both Britain and Ireland would prefer the parties to reach agreement themselves.