A major step was taken, yesterday, towards the implementation of the Belfast Agreement with the nomination of ministers to a new Northern Ireland Executive which is scheduled to hold its first full meeting on Thursday, following the formal devolution of powers.
For the first time in Irish history a power-sharing coalition of unionists, nationalists and republicans stands ready to take office.
The inaugural meeting of the Executive will be quickly followed by the first sessions of the North-South Ministerial Council, probably in Armagh, and the British-Irish Council in London.
The SDLP's Mr Seamus Mallon was restored to the post of Deputy First Minister-designate yesterday despite having announced his resignation last July.
Against the objections of anti-agreement members, the Assembly voted 71-28 in favour of Mr Mallon holding the office. The Democratic Unionist Party was understood to be taking advice on a possible legal challenge.
Mr Mallon resumes his position alongside the First Minister-designate and leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, Mr David Trimble.
Ten other ministers have been nominated, three from the UUP, three from the SDLP, two from Sinn Fein and two from the Democratic Unionist Party.
The most dramatic development was the nomination of Sinn Fein's Mr Martin McGuinness and Ms Bairbre de Brun to the Executive.
Having waged a paramilitary campaign against the Northern Ireland state and its union with Britain for the past 30 years, the republican movement has now become part of the political dispensation outlined in the Belfast Agreement.
While difficulties remain over the issue of decommissioning, the move has heightened expectations that the history of violent conflict in the North may be reaching an end.
There was some surprise when the UUP chose Mr Sam Foster, Assembly Member for Fermanagh-South Tyrone and a former member of the Ulster Special Constabulary for the post of Environment Minister, despite the widespread expectation Mr John Taylor would be given a portfolio.
The Strangford MP, who previously served in a Stormont government said: "I don't want to do what I did 30 years ago. I am so involved with Westminster, I would rather concentrate on that."
Sinn Fein spokesmen strongly rejected unionist claims that their choice of the portfolios of Education and Health would limit the party's participation in the North-South Ministerial Council.
"There are big areas of co-operation under both Education and Health," a Sinn Fein spokesman said.
The ministers-in-waiting were introduced to their permanent secretaries and private secretaries after nomination.
They will spend today familiarising themselves with their departments. A meeting of the Executive in shadow form is expected to take place tomorrow.
Devolution is due to take effect from midnight tomorrow prior to the first meeting of the Executive proper on Thursday. Following this meeting an IRA interlocutor is to be appointed to the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning.
A meeting of the North-South Ministerial Council in shadow form is to be held in Belfast tomorrow, with the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue and the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Ms Liz O'Donnell representing Dublin; Mr Trimble and Mr Mallon will represent the new Northern Ireland Executive.
The meeting is a technical requirement arising from constitutional considerations relating to the establishment of the northsouth implementation bodies and is likely to be brief.