British Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris has invited Stormont’s five largest parties to hold more roundtable talks next week.
He to the leaders of Sinn Fein, DUP, SDLP, Alliance and UUP on Wednesday, January 4.
The deadline to restore an executive is January 19 or legally he will be under a duty to call an assembly election within 12 weeks.
It is understood he has invited the parties to meet at the Northern Ireland Office next Wednesday morning, January 11.
It is believed that Leo Varadkar also plans to make his first visit to Northern Ireland since being re-elected as Taoisech next week.
Mr Heaton-Harris held a first round of joint talks with the parties just before Christmas, which coincided with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak making his first visit to Northern Ireland since taking over.
Mr Sunak met party leaders and said he would work to ensure the return of power-sharing, which has been suspended since February 2022.
The collapse of a fully functioning government occurred when the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) walked out of the executive in protest over the NI Protocol.
Unionists argue the post-Brexit trading arrangement undermines the North of Ireland’s position in the UK as it keeps the nation aligned with some EU trade rules to ensure goods can move freely across the Irish land border.
There have been five failed attempts to restore the executive since the last assembly election in May, when Sinn Féin won the largest number of seats for the first time.
The DUP has repeatedly refused to vote for a new assembly Speaker – a position that must be filled before any other business can be heard.
The party maintains that it has a mandate from voters not to return to power-sharing until the protocol is changed significantly.
Talks on the protocol have been happening at a technical level between the UK and EU for some months but a resolution does not appear to be imminent.
Teams on both sides have said a window of opportunity exists to agree a deal but they have not specified a timetable.
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