The IRA's recent announcement that it had offered to shoot those responsible for the death of Robert McCartney has a number of significant elements... all of which have been entirely ignored by the media and (naturally) by most of Sinn Fein's competitors in the province, who have been climbing over each other to draw a straight line from the statement to Sinn Fein are responsible for revenge murder.

In No Particular Order:

1. The IRA offered the act to the family and (so far at least) have abided by their decision. In days gone by, they would have just gone straight ahead and done it.
2. The IRA announced it publically.
3. The IRA have (apparently) accepted that going to a court of law is a legitimate course of action for the family. Time was, the authority of the courts was unequivocally rejected by the Republican movement.
4. While they haven't gone quite so far as to talk directly to the police, Sinn Fein has forwarded the names to the Police Ombudsman, who has passed them on to police.
5. Sinn Fein is distancing itself from the statement as fast as it possibly can. Martin McGuinness said he thought it would have been very unfortunate if the organisation had shot the alleged killers. It's not an outright condemnation, but it's a step on the road.

So, to summarise: The IRA isn't sounding at all sure of itself or its support base in the community, and Sinn Fein isn't backing it up. Mean time, both organisations are taking steps towards accepting a more normal view of justice, even if it's not their preferred avenue.

You would have thought that at least some of these would have deserved highlighting somewhere higher than paragraph 10 of the stories, even in normally responsible newspapers.

For the interested: Full text of the statement.