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'Lack of confidence' in Mowlam - Trimble

Mr Trimble said: "One of the great difficulties we have had in implementing the [Good Friday] agreement, particularly in the run-up to the formation of an executive, has been the widespread lack of confidence in the community, particularly among Ulster Unionists, with regard to what the secretary of state will do."

Although Mr Trimble, who is Northern Ireland's first minister, has not called for Dr Mowlam to be sacked, senior Ulster Unionist Party sources have privately said that they would like to see her replaced during the UK Cabinet's summer reshuffle.

Mr Trimble has criticised Dr Mowlam for continuing to allow the early release of IRA prisoners while paramilitary activity continues.

His remarks came as Sinn Fein chief negotiator Martin McGuinness issued a call for the province's assembly to be closed if the parties fail to meet the 30 June devolution deadline.

Mr McGuinness was speaking after a meeting with Irish Foreign Minister David Andrews in Belfast.

He said: ''Assembly members' wages should be stopped and that it should be made quite clear to the rejectionist unionists that the two governments are going to press on with the implementation of all the other aspects of the agreement.''

Mr Andrews has also met Deputy First Minister Seamus Mallon of the SDLP in Belfast to try to find a way to resolve the political deadlock over the decommissioning of terrorist weapons.

The Ulster Unionists say decommissioning must come before an executive including Sinn Fein is set up, but the IRA have not indicated that they will give up weapons at any time in the near future.

At the beginning of the new round of talks on Monday, Dr Mowlam and Mr Andrews appealed to all of the parties in Northern Ireland "to make one last enormous effort to find agreement over the next 10 days".

Unionist dissidents in line

In another development, Ulster Unionists who have been threatening to withdraw their support from Mr Trimble, if he plans to form an executive with Sinn Fein before IRA decommissioning, have released statements supporting him.

Deputy leader of the UUP, John Taylor, who last week threatened to resign as a negotiator if Mr Trimble's position changed, said: ''I fully support David Trimble's negotiating position that there must be a start to decommissioning prior to Sinn Fein entering the Executive at Stormont.''

Dissident Ulster Unionist MP Jeffrey Donaldson said that he met Mr Trimble on Monday night to discuss the possibility of him re-joining the unionist negotiating team.

Mr Donaldson said he put ''certain proposals'' to Mr Trimble and that the two men are to have further talks.

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