AT the beginning of a new year most people reflect on the one that has just gone and ponder about what will happen in the months to come. There is little doubt that 2016 has, in global political terms, been a momentous year, one in which certainty was turned on its head.

The Road Safety Authority and An Garda Síochána have renewed their appeal to drivers not to drink and drive, especially over the holiday weekend.

On Thursday, US president Barack Obama announced the expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats working out of the Russian embassy in Washington. They were declared ‘persona non grata’ and given 72 hours to leave the US with their families.

Ever since 1991, the release of the state papers has become an annual ritual for the Irish media. Prior to that, they had to look to state papers being released in Britain, or the US to get information on what was happening in this country.

Some of the 30-year-old archive material published today shows how very little has changed and how very much has changed.

Ireland has lost yet another great writer. A little more than a month since the death of William Trevor at the age of 88, it was announced yesterday that Anthony Cronin had died, also aged 88.