Sinn Féin and the Ulster Unionist Party have made small but welcome concessions to reality but have not yet accepted that comprehensive talks are the only way forward, according to the SDLP leader, Mr Mark Durkan.
In the past week Mr David Trimble had accepted that formal disbandment of the IRA was not necessary.
Mr Gerry Adams, for his part, had conceded that allegations of IRA wrongdoing in Castlereagh, Colombia and Castle Buildings, Stormont, had had a negative effect on unionist confidence in the Belfast Agreement, Mr Durkan said.
"The SDLP has long been clear that IRA activity has not only affected unionist confidence in the agreement but also helped collapse our democratic institutions of government and is holding the nationalist community back," he added.
"We have been equally clear that unionist preconditions of formal IRA disbandment are unhelpful and unworkable. Instead, we need to focus on how best we can end all illegal and untoward paramilitary activity."
Mr Durkan said, however, that neither Sinn Féin nor the UUP had accepted that "all-in talks agreeing an all-out effort to implement the agreement" were the route out of crisis.
"Instead Sinn Féin demands that the British government publish an implementation plan for all of the agreement.
"Conveniently, they forget their own mantra - that implementing the agreement is a collective responsibility and not just the responsibility of the British government.
"Meanwhile David Trimble does not even turn up for the talks. He continues to indulge his fantasy that the only issue is IRA activity.
"For sure, that is one of the confidence issues. But he does nothing to build nationalist confidence when he will not sit down in talks, never mind sit down in government."
Mr Durkan said the parties should agree an "implementation compact" where time-scales would be set for carrying out remaining elements of the agreement.
"That way, when we come back from crisis - and we will come back - there will be no more breakdowns waiting to happen.
"There will be no more blocks further on up the road, no more pending excuses for walk-outs or standoffs," the SDLP leader added.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin's chief negotiator, Mr Martin McGuinness, said yesterday that the next four to six weeks were crucial to breaking the political deadlock.
"If by that time we can't see the essential progress that is required then I think we are going to be in great difficulty," he added.
The former UUP minister, Mr Dermot Nesbitt, told a mainly nationalist audience in Clonard Monastery in west Belfast last night that unionists were not asking anything more from nationalists that they were seeking from the unionist community.
"A stable government in Northern Ireland will only be sustainable with the total absence of paramilitarism from both communities.
"That means an end to all activity - no more street violence, no more punishment beatings, no more harassment, no more extortion.
"Private armies must disappear permanently," he added.
