With just over two weeks to go before voting, the Irish presidential race is showing no signs of letting up.
The week began with Dana Rosemary Scallon, an Irish-American citizen, saying her dual nationality would be an advantage to Ireland if she is elected to the position and wouldn't be a hindrance.
"I have dual citizenship," she said.
"Ireland, Israel and Canada share the advantage of being allowed to have joint citizenship. For citizens of these three countries, there is no conflict in holding a U.S. passport and a passport of these countries."
Ms. Scallon said she obtained the dual nationality in 1999 but rejected claims she tried to hide her U.S. citizenship, which her sister Susan Stein revealed during a court case in the U.S. during a row over ownership of some of the singer's recordings.
"I think it's a very low ebb that the media would use a family dispute, which is painful, which we have settled, in order to paint me in some way as deceiving the people of this country," Scallon said.
"There's not one family who hasn't had difficulties, and we worked our way through it. If you look at the wording of the oath it's a couple of hundred years old, old testament language. If you take it literally you would have to give up your Irish citizenship. But it's moved on since then."
Meanwhile, Fine Gael candidate, Gay Mitchell, warned voters about "electing a celebrity" as president or "someone who will sip champagne and recite poetry" in Áras an Uachtaráin.
Mitchell claimed the electorate would make a major error by picking a candidate for superficial reasons.
"If we choose celebrity over substance we are making a very serious mistake. I think there are people who are very good candidates but don't have the experience or the vision that I have," he said.
Asked who he was referring to, Mitchell said he was not going to name names. He also admonished nameless rivals for "failing to confront" Sinn Féin-nominated candidate Martin McGuinness on his record.
"I think you should start asking some of them [the other candidates] very difficult questions. When I started asking Martin McGuinness difficult questions, people say I am attacking him.
McGuinness himself was confronted by the son of a soldier killed by the IRA in 1983 during a canvass in Westmeath. David Kelly, whose father Private Patrick Kelly was killed alongside Gary Sheehan, a garda trainee from County Monaghan in County Leitrim, during a joint Garda and Army operation to rescue businessman Don Tidey, described the Sinn Féin politician as a "liar" for saying he did not know the identity of the IRA members who killed his father.
He confronted McGuinness and accused him of being a member of the IRA army council at the time. McGuinness denied he was lying about the matter, that he was in the IRA at the time, or was a member of its army council.
During a speech in Meath, McGuinness said his heart went out to families in the Republic who had lost relatives during the conflict, "including gardaí and Army personnel," and that there was a need for a "real process of national reconciliation".
"I understand the individual pain felt by victims and the relatives of victims on all sides and none in the recent conflict cannot be healed overnight. Some may never heal. I want to deepen and expand the role of the president to lead the process of national reconciliation in Ireland."
Independent candidate Sean Gallagher, meanwhile, has said his links to Fianna Fáil are a "non-issue. He said that he has never made a secret of his involvement with the party after it emerged he had only resigned from the party's national executive in January 2011, despite his previous claim to have left the party in 2009.
"I've never made any secret of my involvement in Fianna Fáil and I've spoken about that many months ago. To me, this is a non-issue. It would be very sad in Ireland to be demonizing people who are involved in political organizations.
"If there is negativity coming from anybody, it will not be coming from me and I will stay focused on my positive message of confidence for the people," he said.
