Our regular contributors select their highlights of the year.

His name may be best known for fish and chips, but Leo Burdock was trying to batter Black & Tans in the War of Independence.

Eleanor McEvoy suffered the tragic loss of her collaborator while making her new album, writes Ed Power.

Latest: The fire has been extinguished and the road reopened to traffic.

Standing solemnly at the same site and same time as the first shot rang out on Easter Monday 1916, Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan stooped to carefully place a wreath beside Dublin’s City Hall.

A few moments of their time and a few words from the heart were all anyone who signed books of condolence for the victims of the Berkeley tragedy had to give, but they gave it with the deep wish that it somehow could be more.

Students at Dublin Institute of Technology bonded in grief across the world yesterday to remember those who died or were injured in the Berkeley balcony collapse in California.

In recent weeks, I have been praising Spain as a source of good value but this week I want to focus on Italy.

As December rolls around, people start getting into the Christmas spirit. Spectacular street lights are turned on, trees are decorated, and markets roll out the festive cheer.

A man has been arrested following a raid on a cannabis grow house in Dublin's South Inner City.

It was a special day for a special little boy yesterday as supermarket chain Tesco created 104 new jobs by opening its latest Irish store.

Jennifer has been writing for years.

One of the owners of a jewellery shop on Aungier Street in Dublin city centre says he tried to fight off an armed robber as his store was held up yesterday.

Gardaí in Dublin are investigating an armed robbery on a jewellery store in the city centre.

Gardaí are appealing for witnesses following an assault in Dublin city centre last night which has left a teenager in a serious condition in hospital.

A teenager is in a serious condition in hospital following a serious assault last night in Dublin city centre.

WHEN I meet Henry McKean in The Humble Bean café on Aungier Street in Dublin he has the gait and face of a man who has just been through hell.

A Yale graduate and a rugby team vice-captain have each been fined €200 after they sat each other’s Leaving Certificate physics exam.

Impresario John Reynolds’ nightclub business has been forced to hand over almost half a million euro as part of an investigation into tax defaulters.

IN the good old days of the Celtic Tiger, the one thing sure to raise the ire of the punter was increases to the price of the pint and a box of 20.

The High Court has ordered the winding up of two companies operating restaurants of celebrity chef Conrad Gallagher.

The Dublin fire brigade have safely put out a fire on Aungier Street.

THE company that runs the Dublin Business School (DBS) saw pre-tax profits rise from €3 million to €3.1m in 2009.

Two teenagers questioned about a violent attack on a Polish man who died have been released without charge, gardaí confirmed today.

A homeless man, who recklessly stabbed another man with a syringe after a row broke out while he was begging for money is to be sentenced in October at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court .

FOOD fashionistas are going green – eating locally grown food and reducing their carbon footprint, Ireland’s leading food critic has claimed.

Gardaí are investigating the cause of a blaze at a business premises on Aungier Street in Dublin last night.

A Dublin teenager serving a 12-year sentence for the brutal rape of a homeless woman has been given a concurrent three-year sentence for stabbing a man who let him sleep in his flat.

One of Ireland’s oldest camera shops is to cease trading tomorrow after more than 60 years on Dublin’s O’Connell Street.

A man accused of murdering a woman with a lump hammer after she bit his penis, wrapped her body up in bedclothes and left it outside his flat, a jury in the Central Criminal Court heard today.

A YOUNG man was hospitalised yesterday after being attacked with a meat cleaver.

A man was today charged with the murder of a shop owner in Dublin city centre.

A 55-year-old man was due before Dublin District Court today charged with the murder of a woman whose body was found in Dublin’s city centre on Tuesday.

A 55-year-old man was still being held this morning by gardaí investigating the discovery of a woman’s body in Dublin’s city centre on Tuesday.

THE woman murdered and dumped in the street earlier this week was a mother of two who ran a record shop in Dublin city centre.

Gardaí investigating the murder of a woman in Dublin city centre tonight named the victim as Rosemary Dowling.

GARDAÍ were last night no closer to identifying a woman whose dead body was dumped in a Dublin city centre street.

Friends and colleagues tonight paid glowing tribute to a young footballer who plunged to his death in an accident at his Longford home.

THE young French student stabbed at an apartment complex in Dublin midweek, was the victim of a robbery, gardaí said yesterday.

A YOUNG French student, fighting for her life after being repeatedly stabbed in the neck and throat, is believed to have been followed into a Dublin city centre apartment block by her attacker.

Five people were treated in hospital after two men in a stolen car went on the rampage in Dublin city centre, gardaí said today.

A HOMELESS shelter that allows residents to freely drink on the premises has opened in Dublin, the first in Ireland.