Leading Northern Ireland churchmen have issued an appeal to the IRA to decommission its illegal weapons amid fears that the peace process is entering its final week.

Former Presbyterian moderator Dr John Dunlop said it was not enough that the IRA guns remained silent.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4, he said republicans run the risk of "collapsing the entire process down around their heads".

"Their inability to do anything on this issue is putting the whole process under real threat," he said.

President of the Methodist Church Dr Kenneth Wilson has said the IRA had the power to ease the logjam. He issued a direct appeal to the republican paramilitary group on BBC Radio Ulster's Sunday Sequence.

"Even if until this moment you never intended to decommission, it's possible for you to change, it's possible for you make a magnaminous gesture."

He said this would not mean "marching in time to the British tune or to the unionist tune, but if I may say, to God's tune".

The appeals come at the beginning of a week in which a bill to suspend the Northern Ireland Assembly is being discussed in Westminster.

Crucial meeting

Northern Ireland Secretary of State Peter Mandelson introduced the bill in the House of Commons on Thursday, saying it would become law if there was no positive move on IRA decommissioning in the coming week.

The latest appeals follow a statement from the IRA which said that the arms issue could be resolved - but not on British and unionist terms.

The day scheduled for suspension of the Assembly is also the day before an Ulster Unionist ruling council meeting takes place on Saturday to review progress.

General John de Chastelain's report to the two governments on decommissioning has yet to be published.

If progress on the issue is made, a second report could be published next week.