Dúirt siad - The week in quotes

At last, the DUP has been smoked out, fundamentalist unionism exposed to the world. It was never about the IRA, IRA weapons, IRA threats. It was and is about civil rights. — Danny Morrison, Andersonstown News, 20 September

Ian Paisley has sustained with vitriolic determination an onslaught on the Good Friday Agreement, with the ambition of tearing it up. — Editorial, The Examiner, 20 September

The failure of the talks exposes the fundamental flaw in British Prime Minister Tony Blair's approach to the peace process. In a speech demanding "acts of completion'' from republicans in October 2002, Blair backed the unionist boycott of the power-sharing assembly, and put the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement on hold. — Seán Mac Carthaigh, Sunday Business Post, 19 September

When the DUP and Sinn Féin met in the corridor last week, the unionists still could not bring themselves to speak to the republicans. What hope for power-sharing if "hello" is too much to ask? — Eamonn MacDermott, Sunday Business Post, 19 September

Completion, completion, completion is what we require. — DUP Deputy Leader Peter Robinson writing in the Belfast Telegraph, 15 September

It will not be enough for the DUP to say that it has a mandate and to dig its heels in. All parties have electoral mandates. — Editorial, The Sunday Times, 19 September

Many nationalists and republicans look at the record of the DUP, its links with unionist paramilitaries, in particular its participation in the founding of Ulster Resistance, and are sceptical that the DUP is prepared to reach an agreement within the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. — Gerry Adams writing in the Irish Times on Monday 13 September, in the lead-up to the talks

Gerry Adams can talk waffle until the cows come home. — Ian Paisley addressing journalists during the talks.

How can any party expect to come to negotiations and not negotiate, and not talk to other parties? — Gerry Adams asks the question on everybody's mind at a press conference as the talks ended on Saturday 18 September

The governments believe now that what is on offer is reasonable in its substance and historic in its meaning. We are determined to move ahead." — Joint statement from the two governments following the talks.

It matters little that the DUP and Sinn Féin have still not spoken to each other. — The Irish Independent's Gene McKenna displays breathtaking ignorance of the situation at last week's talks, 20 September

The niggling question remains, however, whether Dr Paisley's DUP is seeking the end of the IRA as a paramilitary force as a precondition for devolved government or whether it wants a return to majority rule. — Editorial, the Irish Times, 20 September

Perhaps the DUP, like 19th-Century maidens, do not wish to say yes at the first time of asking. If they are wise, they will accept a compromise when the talks reconvene. — Editorial, Irish Independent, 20 September

As a reading of today's papers shows, unionists are in danger of being painted as being the villains of the piece, even though the Republican Movement must still bear the ultimate responsibility for the stalemate. — The Belfast Telegraph's editorial team try to redress the balance

You may be in your coffins before I am in mine. — Ian Paisley further endears himself with 'Romanist' journalists after they suggest health problems may affect his performance at the talks