Adams maintains poll pressure

David Trimble and Gerry Adams held talks

Northern Ireland's political process can be regenerated if an election is called, Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams has said.

He was speaking after meeting Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble as part of a series of talks to broker a deal to revive the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Northern Ireland's devolved administration was suspended last October amid allegations of IRA intelligence gathering in the Stormont government.

Assembly elections were postponed in May but there is speculation that a fresh poll will be called before Christmas.

David Trimble and Gerry Adams held their third face-to-face meeting in recent weeks on Tuesday.

Afterwards, Mr Adams said an assembly poll should be called as a matter of principle.

Gerry Adams had a message for Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern

He said: "There was huge damage done to confidence in the process by the rejection of IRA initiatives - by the rejection of words said by me. To compound it all, by the cancellation of the elections.

"The election has to be the starting point of a context of regenerating and accelerating the process."

Mr Trimble, who had addressed an international conference in Israel on the theme of leadership in a time of change, would not be drawn on the talks.

He also met Ulster Unionist Party officers to discuss internal divisions over the recent British Irish joint declaration.

Earlier, Mr Adams said the British and Irish governments needed to have some sense of what was possible, and pointed out his party had gone on an election footing.

'Elections imminent'

Former UUP Assembly member Dermot Nesbitt said republicans needed to convince unionists of a permanent end to violence.

"This is about an issue that goes to the very heart of democratic values, the protection of democracy against the threat of violence," he told a political conference at Stormont.

Democratic Unionist MP Gregory Campbell said elections followed by negotiations offered the best hope of progress.

He said many of the problems in the political process had been ignored amid "all of the fuss about Sinn Fein, decommissioning and the countless meetings of the Ulster Unionist Council".

On Monday, SDLP leader Mark Durkan said he believed fresh Assembly elections were imminent.