LONDON, Feb. 22 (Xinhua) -- Newly-elected leader of the Irish political party Sinn Fein Mary Lou McDonald said Thursday that talks to reinstate a new government for the province of Northern Ireland had reached a "decisive phase" and called for "positive political momentum."
McDonald told a press briefing in London that "The Good Friday Agreement is entering its 20th anniversary and now is a moment to be decisive, and we told British Prime Minister (Theresa) May this."
On Wednesday, May held talks with Irish republicans Sinn Fein and unionists the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) in London to try to get a Northern Ireland government, known as the Assembly, reformed.
McDonald, who was in London for the talks, held the press conference with London's Foreign Press Association (FPA) to give her verdict on the failure of the talks to reestablish a government for the province.
"It is not tenable 14 months on after a draft agreement had been struck and then walked away from by the DUP to say that the answer is a period of reflection," she said.
"We need decisive leadership. We need the two governments Dublin and London to work hand in hand, an inter-governmental conference, and a map to resolve the methodology and issues of language, marriage equality and inquests and a positive political dynamic to get the Assembly up and running."
Gay marriage, use of the Gaelic language and an examination of deaths caused by paramilitary organizations during the Troubles period from the 1970s to 1998 when the Good Friday Agreement brought peace to Northern Ireland are key points for Sinn Fein in talks to reinstate the government.
Northern Ireland has been without a government for months, since the power-sharing government of Sinn Fein and the DUP failed to reform after elections in 2017.
A week ago talks in Northern Ireland's capital Belfast on the government reform collapsed, prompting calls from some unionists for a direct rule for the province from the British government.
The issue of reforming the Northern Ireland Assembly is now complicated by Brexit, with fears that Britain's exit from the European Union (EU) could see a hard border set up between Northern Ireland and Ireland and weaken the deal brokered between both Ireland and Britain and all the political parties in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
"The difficulty for us was that we negotiated for 14 months in good faith with people in the room with whom we reached an agreement but they were not able to deliver," said Sinn Fein negotiator Conor Murphy, who is at the center of talks to reinstate the Northern Ireland Assembly.
He added that the prospect of getting back to the negotiating table was frustrated because the people carrying out the negotiations were not those making decisions.
