The petition, received by Newry and Mourne Council on Friday, opposed the public meeting at a community centre in Forkhill, County Armagh.

A meeting of Newry and Mourne DPP planned for Monday in the mainly nationalist village was subsequently postponed.

One of the petition organisers, Paul O'Brien who lives in Forkhill, said it was "absolutely not a political petition".

"I am a resident, and myself and the other residents got together and decided we had to do something," he said.

"There's hundreds of people have signed this petition, there's 98% of the village have signed this petition. We're sick of what we see going on here."

Ulster Unionist assembly member Danny Kennedy, a member of the DPP, said it would have been wrong to put members of the partnership into a difficult situation.

There are people in the area who don't want the DPP there for their own political reasons Henry Reilly Ulster Unionist

"The paramount concern is for their personal safety and not to put them into a confrontational position that would make it very, very difficult for them," he said.

Henry Reilly, also an Ulster Unionist member of the DPP, said Forkhill was chosen as a venue because approaches had been made from nationalists to DPP members about policing in the area.

He said the DPP would carry out its own survey of residents in the area, before deciding about any future meeting.

"We are confident that we're going to get a fairly good response. There are people in the area who don't want the DPP there for their own political reasons, people who see themselves as the police for that area.

"Obviously through time we will have to completely be responsible for policing in that area."

But Sinn Fein's Conor Murphy accused the DPP of "putting their heads in the sand and not being aware of the fact that people don't have confidence in the DPP".

People don't have confidence in the new policing arrangements and they want a normal and proper policing service Conor Murphy Sinn Fein

"They don't have confidence in the new policing arrangements and they want a normal and proper policing service," he said.

"But holding meetings in community centres throughout south Armagh to try to give that impression when the reality on the ground is very much different, is really ignoring the reality of the policing situation in south Armagh."

In a statement, Newry and Mourne District Council said the decision to postpone the meeting was taken because the DPP was "concerned with building community relations in the district, not destroying community relations".

"The DPP will carry out its own consultation with the community in Forkhill and reserves the right to reschedule the meeting at a later date," it said.

In recent months, there has been a series of threats and attacks on members of policing partnerships across the province.

District policing partnerships were set up across Northern Ireland under reforms initiated by a commission headed by former Hong Kong Governor Chris Patten and implemented by the government.

The partnerships are made up of councillors and members of the local community, who work alongside the Police Service of Northern Ireland's 29 District Command Units in trying to meet local community policing needs.