Shannon Peace Camp hits the headlines / Sparks off National Debate / Next Shannon Protest Sat J18

Wednesday January 15, 2003 13:14

by IMC

On the coldest night of the year so far, the 4/5 January, a Peace Camp was established at Shannon Airport. The Peace Camp kicked off with a 24 hour Women’s Peace Camp and quickly began to draw a huge amount of attention from the National Media . Comment here:

The Green Party and the Labour Party have put their shoulders to the wheel on the issue and both are calling for the suspension of US military use of Shannon Airport.

Debates on the legalities of US military use of Shannon broke out of the Indymedia ghetto, got an extensive airing on National TV and Radio, and ended up on the front pages of UK and Irish Sunday Newspapers.

It remains to be seen if the debate that has taken place will make an impact on the size of the upcoming protests at Shannon Airport (18th Jan) and in Dublin (15 Feb).
These protests have been arranged to coincide with global days of anti-war action.

Obviously feeling the pressure, Brian Cowen has released a statement to the media which characterises the extensive US military use of Shannon in the buildup to a possible war in Iraq as ‘business as usual’. Meanwhile Tim Hourigan and others are maintaining their close watch on US Military use of the airport and they continue to inform the authorities of their findings.