Senior Ulster Unionist politician Mr Dermot Nesbitt yeserday branded the DUP's position a deceitful smokescreen.
Mr Nesbitt, responding to the DUP's Devolution Now document, said yesterday: "The DUP's main aim in the Assembly election was stated as wanting to see an end to the Belfast Agreement and obtain a new agreement. Well, we now know the reality and it is not what the DUP promised. They have used the oldest trick in the book: the DUP has re-branded the same product. For 'Belfast Agreement' read 'Mandatory Coalition'.
"Gregory Campbell said we were not going back to the 1998 model, however it was crystal clear from Peter Robinson's interview on Inside Politics on Saturday that this is their accepted model as a final outcome.
"Also in the DUP's words 'we will not legitimise terrorists before or after the elections'. Yet now the DUP states that it will give 'equal value to all parties in accordance with their mandates'.
"What now you may ask is the DUP's attitude towards Sinn Fein? The answer is simple. The DUP is now happy to accept Sinn Fein exercising executive power without their being any end to paramilitary activity. Such is the magnitude of the DUP U-turn," Mr Nesbitt said.
"Worse, Peter Robinson on Inside Politics tried to compare the NI Assembly having full power with that of Westminster or district councils.
"This is a deceitful smokescreen to hide the DUP's massive U-turn. I challenge Peter Robinson to justify his analogy! Peter Robinson used to hold to the view that dealing with paramilitary activity was more important than political initiatives."