UUP cancel Ruling Council meeting

A meeting of the Ulster Unionist Party's Ruling Council has been cancelled because of a failure to reach a deal with republicans.

Party officers met at Cunningham House on Monday night and decided to call off the meeting which was due to take place on Wednesday in the Ramada Hotel in Belfast.

Party chairman James Cooper announced the decision following yesterday's meeting.

The cancellation followed an attack by Sinn Féin's Alex Maskey who accused the party of "walking away" from the peace process.

Mr Maskey said that while the recent dialogue between the UUP and Sinn Féin was, in itself, a hugely important development, there was a belief that the UUP had "effectively walked away for this phase of the process".

However, in a statement the UUP rejected the former Lord Mayor's claims and said that if Republicans were committed to finding a solution, they needed "to focus on what is required from them to get things back on track and spend less time indulging in the ‘blame game’ on the airwaves and in newspaper columns".

Meanwhile, Downing Street today said that despite recent problems elections would go ahead on 26 November.

In today's statement the Government said it remained optimistic and fully committed to the process.

"The British and Irish governments will then work with the parties to enable devolved government to be restored to the people of Northern Ireland," the statement added.

(MB)