The Taoiseach says he is not opposed to a further task-force between the Gardai and PSNI to crackdown on criminality.

Enda Kenny's comments come after a review into paramilitary structures in the North outlined that the Provisional IRA and other terror groups still exist.

But the P.S.N.I/M-I-5 assessment says that while the army council of the IRA still exists, the IRA of the Troubles is now beyond recall. Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa Villiers today told the House of Commons that "the leaderships of the main paramilitary groups are committed to peaceful means to achieve their political objectives".

Reading from the report, she added: "We judge that individual members of paramilitary groups with a legacy of violent activity still represent a threat to national security".

An assessment by Garda Commissioner Noirín O'Sullivan is due to be published this afternoon.

The DUP MLA's are to return to talks and their jobs as Ministers in the executive, with a statement saying they accept the firm conclusion that the republican leadership is committed to the peace process.

Enda Kenny's told the Dáil that paramilitaries have no place in Ireland anymore and "21 years after the IRA ceasefire it is past time that it should carry any capacity for threat.

"Statements to the effect that the IRA have gone away or have left the stage are simply not credible.

"There may have been a time when living with constructive ambiguity helped the peace process but that time has now passed and paramilitarism in all its vestiges must be removed," he added.

The review was called for after the murder of Kevin McGuigan in August - a suspected revenge attack for the murder of former IRA commander Gerard Davison three months earlier.