Saturday 25 May 2013
It is important to say at the outset that I am sorry for any stress and anxiety caused over the last few weeks to any older person currently residing in our statutory residential care homes and their families.
Belief in witches was a significant part of Irish culture, while Scottish and English settlers in Ireland often accused each other of witchcraft. It is commonly assumed that the European witch-craze of the 16th and 17th centuries, which claimed tens of thousands of lives, never reached Irish shores.
For years, academics from Queen's University have been engaged in transformative research in many parts of the world, helping people to make the transition from conflict to peace.
THIS session of parliament is less than two weeks old, but Jim Shannon has certainly hit the ground running, putting his name to 43 early day motions on an eclectic range of issues.
SIR Alex Ferguson was honoured by MPs last week for his contribution to football – not just in Manchester, but in Northern Ireland.
All sides who took part in the Cardiff talks aimed at defusing marching season tensions certainly deserve praise for their endeavours.
What can be said of Samuel Neilson?
It would be naive to think that any company, especially a multi-national corporation, would not seek to protect its profits through exploiting every tax efficiency it can.
News that another major Hollywood studio is to make a movie in Northern Ireland is confirmation of the province's standing as a film location.
In the end, they changed their minds. But Turkish Airlines did announce that they would prohibit red lipstick for flight attendants – a "more muted look" was declared better-suited to the brand.
It has been a tough few days for Tory party chairman Grant Shapps. He has been caught up in a row about whether a senior colleague did, or did not, call Conservative grassroots members "mad, swivel-eyed loons".
Supporters of the North West 200 have been bitterly disappointed by the abandonment of Saturday's races due to bad weather, even though there were brighter spells earlier in the week.
Maybe it's time to update Winston Churchill, because, 93 years after his bleakly cynical observation, it's clear that it's not just the "dreary steeples of Fermanagh and Tyrone" which continue to bear witness to the integrity and duration of our differences here.
If any political axiom has best defined Barack Obama's rise to America's top office, perhaps the notion that 'In politics, perception is everything' would fit best.
It may be tempting for some people to dismiss the Cardiff talks between the police, republicans, loyalists and politicians because they appear not to have achieved a great deal.
Then, as I popped open my fourth beer and composed another withering tweet about this year's Eurovision experience, I noticed something from the corner of my eye. Indeed, the rest of Europe did much the same thing.
Anyone attending this week's Balmoral Show will have sensed the new air of optimism from Northern Ireland's agriculture and food industries.
The latest Dan Brown blockbuster was released this week: cue line-up of detractors rushing to rubbish it, while secretly seething with jealousy at his soaring sales figures.
For anyone who regularly travels back and forth across the Irish Sea, the transformation which has taken place in the past 20 years has been immense. That progress should not be under-estimated, or discounted.
John Hume's exhortation, borrowed from his father, that "You can't eat a flag" comes to mind whenever the issue of flags and emblems flares up.
Three-day festival underway in Derry
Video, pictures and finisihng times
Comedy with big following means blockbuster
One of Apple's first computers, a functioning 1976 model, has been sold for a record 516,000 euros (£441,000).
Forty eight people have been rescued from a passenger boat after it hit a rock on a Welsh island, coastguards have said.
Thousands of athletes have joined victims of the Boston Marathon bombings to run and walk the last mile of the race, reclaiming the triumph of crossing the finish line.
Manchester City striker Sergio Aguero has underlined his commitment to the Barclays Premier League club by signing a one-year contract extension.
Northampton captain Dylan Hartley's British and Irish Lions hopes appear to lie in tatters after he was sent off for dissent during Saints' 37-17 Aviva Premiership final defeat against Leicester at Twickenham.
Dylan Hartley could be suspended from the British and Irish Lions tour after he was sent off during the Aviva Premiership final.
The Saturdays have lit up the stage at Radio 1's Big Weekend in Northern Ireland.
Fantastic Four star Ioan Gruffudd gets on better with big-name actors than "wannabes".
David Beckham has a host of plans he wants to fulfill with his family now he has retired from playing soccer.
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