As the dust settles on last week's victory, most Sinn Féin members will have noticed that one of the most significant events to occur over the elections was not simply the return of 24 seats. We knew they were coming - the work had been put in. What we couldn't expect, or hope for, was the favourable commentary being dished out by a usually hostile media. Free article

"Anyone who talks to Sinn Féin will be out of my party." - DUP leader Ian Paisley, speaking to journalists, 27 November. "We have done business with Ian Paisley in the past on the agricultural committee in the Assembly. He didn't do a bad job." - Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams responds to DUP rhetoric, 27 November. Free article

Last month, Sinn Féin presented a submission on reform of the Garda Síochána to the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. The following is a summary if that proposal. The full submission is available at www.sinnfein.ie. Free article

An Army with Banners: The Real Face of Orangeism - By William Brown Beyond the Pale Publications, Belfast (2003) Price: £12.99/€19 With anti-Agreement unionists enjoying big electoral gains, we can expect more strident demands for republican decommissioning over the coming weeks, along the familiar line: No guns, no government. Free article

Martin Meehan's close call MARTIN MEEHAN'S close call in his bid for an Assembly seat in the green glens of Antrim could have been even closer if he'd called at the wrong house. Canvassing in places that other republicans have not reached, one intrepid republican ex-prisoner knocked at the door of a gentleman even more veteran than our Martin. Free article

Liam Mellows was born and educated in County Galway, where he joined Na Fianna, the republican boys movement founded by Constance Markievicz. He spent much of his youth in Castletown, County Wexford, with his grandmother. He asked to be buried there amongst his relatives in a place he called "the old graveyard of his own parish". Free article