Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness has challenged the Orange Order to make a contribution to the peace process by stopping attempts to march through Catholic areas.
Delivering a speech at the annual Wolfe Tone commemoration at Bodenstown, Co Kildare, the Sinn Fein MP said the leadership of the Orange Order could no longer abdicate its responsibilities.
"Now is the time for the Orange Order to step forward," said Mr McGuinness.
"There are hundreds of Orange Parades each year. Only a few cause controversy. It is these I want to focus on.
"The days of republicans stretching ourselves and our communities to maintain calm in the face of sectarian provocation cannot last forever.
"It is time for the issue of contested parades to be dealt with once and for all."
The Deputy First Minister called on the Orange Order to declare they will no longer seek to force parades through catholic areas and risk bringing violence onto the streets.
"Anything less from the Orange Order is an abdication of their responsibility and will have to be viewed as such by both governments - and in such a scenario that means a clear statement from both that nationalist communities will no longer be subjected to these sorts of triumphalist parades and measures taken to ensure that this happens," he added.
'Unhelpful'
An Orange Order spokesman said the Deputy First Minister's comments were a disappointing attack on the Protestant community.
"For years, Sinn Fein policy has been to make life as difficult as possible for parade organisers," the spokesman claimed.
"They have totally failed to understand that parading is an integral part of the Protestant culture.
The Orange Order is working very hard to make its parades more family friendly and welcoming, particularly to tourists, and these remarks from the Deputy First Minister are extremely unhelpful."
DUP MLA Mervyn Storey also accused Mr McGuinness of making unhelpful comments which did not address republicans' intolerance of Protestant culture.
He said: "The comments from Martin McGuinness are yet another example of republicans shifting the responsibility for dealing with the issue of parades from themselves to the Orange Order.
Rather than attack the Loyal Orders Sinn Fein would be better to give leadership and promote tolerance of the Protestant culture of which parading is an integral part."
© Press Association