**Progress is being made in emergency talks between the DUP and Sinn Fein, a Downing Street spokesman has said.**Prime Ministers Gordon Brown and Brian Cowen travelled to Northern Ireland to break the deadlock over transferring justice powers from London to Belfast.
They arrived at Hillsborough Castle amid concerns that the power-sharing government at Stormont could collapse.
It is thought the talks will continue late into the night. Mr Brown will stay overnight, with more talks on Tuesday.
His spokesman said discussions were being held “in the right spirit”, but added it was important to be “realistic”.
Taking a break from negotiations, Sinn Fein’s Gerry Kelly told waiting reporters: “The issues are well-known - we can have them sorted out very quickly.”
ANALYSIS
From Mark Devenport at Hillsborough CastleAfter a period of stability it looks now we are back to prime ministers trying to pull something out of the fire.First and Deputy First Ministers Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness met earlier at Stormont, but one must presume did not produce a great deal. It only lasted for 35 minutes.
One has to assume the message went out afterwards, particularly from Sinn Fein, that it was time for direct governmental involvement.
It’s entirely possible with them coming this late in the evening that they might stay overnight.
We haven’t been guided towards that, but we do have Gordon Brown’s comments earlier that he said he was prepared to spend a substantial amount of time.
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Speaking outside the talks, DUP MP Sammy Wilson said Sinn Fein had created this “contrived crisis”.
“Despite the way it has been handled, we are still open to resolving the outstanding issues,” he said.
“It makes it darn more difficult in this atmosphere of crisis to get some kind of resolution - these things are much better done by people sitting down calmly, seeing where the problems are and what compromises can be made.”
At this stage, the talks do not involve the other main political parties, the Ulster Unionist Party, the nationalist SDLP and the cross-community Alliance.
Sinn Fein and the Democratic Unionist Party - Northern Ireland’s two biggest political parties - have been arguing for months over the transfer of policing and justice powers from Westminster to Stormont.
Sinn Fein want the completion of devolution to happen as soon as possible, but the DUP argue there must be unionist “community confidence” before powers are put in the hands of local politicians.
The “confidence” issue causing most division is over the handling of parades.
The DUP wants to scrap the Parades Commission, which puts conditions on some of the most contentious marches, but Sinn Fein has accused them of giving the Orange Order a talks veto.
Talks between the two parties intensified in recent weeks, before collapsing in acrimony last week.
If Sinn Fein was to decide Mr McGuinness should resign, the joint nature of the roles of first and deputy first ministers would mean that DUP leader Peter Robinson would also be forced out of office, collapsing the executive.
Before travelling to Northern Ireland, Gordon Brown told a Downing Street news conference: “We believe that the problems that exist in devolving policing and justice are all soluble problems.”
Brian Cowen said he was confident progress would be made, adding: “We believe that our going there should help bring a conclusion to the devolution issues.”
The Ulster Unionists and the nationalist SDLP have both called for the talks to be broadened to include all the parties rather than just the DUP and Sinn Fein.
Ulster Unionist leader Sir Reg Empey said: “We will not be prepared to accept a piece of paper if it was negotiated by others in our absence.”
SDLP assembly member Conall McDevitt said it was important for all the parties to be involved, “otherwise what we will have is old IRA men and people with the best interests of the Orange Order and maybe not of all the people of Northern Ireland, trying to come to conclusions which ultimately will only serve a very narrow section of the community”.
Alliance Party leader David Ford, who is thought to be a possible future justice minister, said it was “unfortunate but necessary” that the prime ministers had to intervene “because politicians here aren’t grown up enough to take their own decisions”.