Mr Martin McGuinness has called on the DUP to enter into direct talks with Sinn Féin.
In a speech at the Sinn Féin Six County AGM in Belfast today, Mr McGuinness said that, while Sinn Féin would not countenance a return to majority rule, he recognised that the DUP's proposals were a shift from the "never never land politics that they have inhabited for decades."
Calling on the DUP to engage with republicans he added: "For decades they have denounced successive British governments as treacherous and dishonest. Yet they now want to use the British government as a conduit to Sinn Féin.
"They should grasp the political reality of the GFA fully and talk to Sinn Féin face to face."