Prime Minister Gordon Brown has pledged to “use all his efforts” in the next few days to ensure the transfer of policing and justice powers to Stormont can go ahead.

In an optimistic assessment of yesterday’s Independent Monitoring Commission report on the Provisional IRA he said it was now time for the political parties to complete the transition of responsibility for policing and justice.

“This is an important and significant day for Northern Ireland — an independent report has told us that the Army Council is no longer operational, is not functioning and is redundant,” he said.

“I believe that this will provide reassurance and hope for everybody who wants to see this chapter of Northern Ireland's history closed. It is now time for all the political parties to work together to complete the final stages of the peace process — to complete the devolution of policing and justice.”

The Republic’s Justice Minister Dermot Ahern also underpinned the positive, and argued: “This report demonstrates not only that PIRA has gone away, but that it won't be coming back.

“The IMC could not have been more unequivocal in its conclusion that the provisional movement is now irreversibly locked into following the political path.”

But First Minister Peter Robinson made clear the Commission’s conclusions — that the so-called Army Council is no longer functional or operational and unlikely to re-emerge — failed to meet the DUP’s bottom line requirement for it to formally disband.

Welcoming the assessment of the IMC, which also played down the prospect of an official announcement that any part of the Provisional IRA has been disbanded, the DUP leader said: “An essential part of building confidence in the community is that the Army Council has moved from a body that is not meeting to one that will never meet again.”

And while he pointed out Sinn Fein’s opposition to the IMC which it regards as a “sop to unionism”, party president Gerry Adams said: “The IRA left the stage some time ago. And while you know Sinn Féin’s position on the IMC, that body confirmed that today. So, the issue of the IRA has been dealt with definitively.

“All concerns have been met. This issue is gone.”

SDLP leader Mark Durkan said, however: “The real and active threat to police personnel, to peace and democracy, is coming from so-called dissident republicans — political uncertainty and threats of instability are grist to their vicious mill.”

Ulster Unionist deputy Assembly leader Danny Kennedy said while there were grounds for believing the IRA has abandoned violence and terrorist structures the community must be given time to absorb the report.