by BBC Ireland Correspondent David Eades

Northern Ireland's peace process is built upon a succession of 11th hour negotiations so assessing what happens next is always a precarious pastime.

Suspension of the Assembly, the Executive and all the attendant bodies born out of the Good Friday Agreement is, likewise, riddled with uncertainties.

The key players in this never-ending process are, undoubtedly, exhausted.

Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness have said so themselves, while close friends and colleagues of David Trimble believe he cannot go on at the same pace without a break.

Mr Mandelson has reportedly found the job more taxing than any other in his political career.

Deadlock

But a review cannot be left for very long, either. While there may be no timescale to it, the chances of lifting a suspension - and returning to a power-sharing Executive must become more remote the longer it takes to resolve the deadlock.

The main parties to the process have very different views as to the justification of suspension, and that will undoubtedly colour their approach to the subsequent review of the Agreement.

Sinn Fein's President Gerry Adams has long argued such a move will jeopardise the entire peace process.

In recent days he has even raised question-marks about his willingness to continue leading his party if suspension happened.

Irish reservations

The Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, also has deep reservations about suspending all the institutions. With such a contrasting view to London's, it may be difficult then to agree on the terms for conducting the review; who should chair it, and where it should be carried out.

One thing which probably can be said with certainty is that the miracle worker himself, the former US Senator George Mitchell, will not return. Last week he distanced himself from the debate.

Sense of crisis

The Ulster Unionists (UUP) are the ones who seem most prepared to step into review.

They have been keen to play down the sense of crisis such a move would create. It must be seen by anyone interested in making the Good Friday Agreement work, to be a better move than allowing UUP ministers to resign from the Executive, leaving the whole political edifice to collapse.

The IRA have made it clear they will not be pushed into decommissioning. They have repeated their commitment to their ceasefire and to the peace process.

The IRA are not prepared to decommission according to the terms laid down by Unionists or the British Government.

For them to concede that decommissioning in any form will happen is itself a huge step to take. To offer a timetable and a means to doing it seems considerably further off.

Their quid pro quo would be for the British to make a move on demilitarising Northern Ireland, reducing troop levels substantially, removing watchtowers and cutting back further on troop patrols.

The police service also needs to be reformed; that is a process which will take years, and that may be the context in which IRA decommissioning should be viewed.

Gloom

With that in mind, it is hard to imagine a review can be carried out in a matter of a few weeks, if it is to end to the satisfaction of all.

The suspension order is good for six months, after which it needs to be renewed. That is a desperately long time in political terms and nobody will want to contemplate such a renewal.

As is so often the case, then, the omens for the peace process are hardly good...uncertainty and gloom is rife...but there remains a majority view across the island of Ireland, that there is still no alternative to the Good Friday Agreement.