The Senior Coroner for Birmingham and Solihull has called for the adjournment of the hearing into the possible resumption of the original Birmingham pub bombings inquest.
West Midlands Police have been asked to disclose further information to the coroner in private.
The Chief constable of West Midlands police has been ordered to produce information, in response to a claim that the force may have been tipped off in advance of the Birmingham pub bombings, by an IRA mole.
A coroner made the order after hearing legal submissions about whether there was enough evidence to reopen inquests into the 21 people who died.
Chris Halpin reports.
A coroner will today hear a petition from relatives of people who died in the Birmingham Pub Bombings to re-open the original inquest.
John Rowlands died in the attacks in 1974 - his son Paul is among victims' families calling for an inquest into their deaths to be reopened.