The internal battle between pro and anti-agreement factions in the Ulster Unionist Party will come to a head at a specially convened Unionist Council meeting on June 16.
Party officers agreed yesterday that the 900-member ruling council meeting will now go ahead.
Yesterday's meeting was atten-ded by party leader David Trimble and leading anti-agreement member Jeffrey Donald-son. The discussions were said to be businesslike and to the point before the date was fixed for the June council summit.
Behind the scenes, however, there was mounting tension and certainly the pro-agreement members are uncomfortable at this development.
Anti-agreement UUP members requested the meeting because they want the party to reject the joint declaration released earlier this month by the British and Irish governments.
Privately, however, some key members and policy makers have described this move as a big tactical mistake in saying no to the entire joint declaration.
The declaration contained pledges on the scaling down of the British army presence in Northern Ireland, policing and justice reform, equality, human rights, support for the Irish and Ulster Scots languages, a sanctions body for parties who contravene the agreement and a scheme which would enable so-called on-the-run paramilitaries to return to the north.
Hardline unionists have been outraged by the proposals on demilitarisation, the scheme for on-the-run paramilitaries and an Irish government nominee on the sanctions body.
Their fury has been fuelled by a leaked memorandum from the General Officer Commanding to army chiefs that the Royal Irish Regiment's home battalions could be disbanded.
Senior army officers have since pulled back, insisting that the 3,000 soldiers attached to the battalions in Omagh, Armagh city and Holywood, Co Down, will only go when the paramilitaries disappears.
It was reported yesterday that the motion, by the anti-agreement faction, which will be put to delegates would urge them to reaffirm the position they took at a council meeting last Sep-tember that they would not go back into government with Sinn Féin until the IRA demonstrated it was beginning to stand down its paramilitary structures.
The motion will also urge delegates to reject proposals linked to the joint declaration.
The likelihood, however, is that an alternative motion, to be put by those who are pro-agreement, will be tabled. The wording of this has still to be worked out but while it will be critical of certain aspects of the declaration the belief is that the whole package should not be ditched.
Although the spotlight has for some time been on republicanism and the IRA's future intentions the Ulster Unionists have, perhaps unwittingly, turned attention back towards themselves and their future of working or not working the agreement and its institutions.
Ironically, the prospects for the success or failure of the Belfast Agreement and the politics of change could all play out inside this council meeting.
Former SDLP minister Sean Farren said the disarray again affecting the UUP posed a major threat to political progress.
"The controversy over the size of the RIR is a fig leaf for an internal struggle for power," he said.
It is time for the UUP to get real and to demonstrate that it is determined to have all of the Good Friday Agreement implemented. That includes the proposals of the joint declaration."
DUP leader Ian Paisley challenged Ulster Unionists to identify the so-called benefits contained within the joint declaration. Mr Paisley said the joint declaration was a blueprint for "the advancement of terrorism" in Northern Ireland.
