Spartacist statement in defence of Mary Kelly

national | anti-war / imperialism | opinion/analysis Wednesday November 24, 2004 20:50 by John - Spartacist Group Ireland syc_dublin at hotmail dot com

Hands off Mary Kelly! Drop the charges now!
US/Britain our of Iraq now! UN stay out! For class struggle against the capitalist rulers at home!

On 28 October, Mary Kelly, a 52-year-old nurse and mother of four, was found guilty of “criminal damage without lawful excuse” for damaging a US military aircraft at Shannon Airport on 29 January 2003. Her sentencing is scheduled for 1 December and she faces up to ten years in prison. She admits striking the aircraft on the nose cone, landing gear and engine cowl with an axe but argued in her defence that “I did what I have done with lawful excuse” to save human life and to prevent Shannon Airport being used to support the invasion of Iraq. Nearly 113,000 US troops transitted through Shannon in the first nine months of this year. It is estimated that by the end of the year, just under 350,000 US troops will have passed through Shannon in the past three years (ie, since the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq). Mary claims this use of Shannon is a violation of both the Irish constitution and international law.

Her first trial, in June 2003, ended in a hung jury on the criminal damage charge, despite Judge Carroll Moran basically instructing the jury to convict her. However, the Director of Public Prosecutions ordered that she be tried again. Her second trial, in June 2004, collapsed when her legal team abandoned her because they refused to pursue the defence she wanted, in particular asking for disclosure of the advice given by the Attorney General to the government regarding the legality of allowing the US imperialists basically unlimited access to Shannon Airport. In her latest trial (again before Judge Moran) she was forced to defend herself because she was unable to obtain new counsel who would defend her in accordance with her wishes. Judge Moran gutted her whole defence by ruling that “You can’t call evidence on political matters or the war in Iraq” and refused her permission to call expert witnesses like former UN weapons inspector Denis Halliday who was to testify about the thousands of deaths caused by US bombing of Iraq and the UN-sanctioned starvation sanctions. The judge was playing his role as part of the Irish state which is intent on making an example of Mary Kelly because her actions exposed the complicity of the Irish government in the US/British colonial war against Iraq. The Irish government supports imperialist war because it is in the economic interests of the Irish capitalist class it represents. The conviction of Mary Kelly is intended as a sinister threat to all opponents of imperialist war. From the perspective of workers and the oppressed Mary’s actions were not a crime! We of the Spartacist Group Ireland demand the charges against Mary Kelly, and all anti-war protesters like Eoin Dubsky and the Ploughshares/Catholic Worker 5 be dropped. Hands off Mary Kelly!

As opposed to individual “direct action” we stress that a more effective way of opposing the Irish bourgeoisie and the use of Shannon by the US imperialists would be to mobilise the social power of the proletariat, in particular the airport workers who should take industrial action to prevent the transit of troops and war materiel through Shannon. However, the pro-capitalist trade union misleaders, while often featured speakers on the platforms of the class-collaborationist Irish Anti-War Movement, didn’t dare mobilise the power of the workers against the war because it would disturb their cosy “social partnership” with the Irish capitalists. Indeed, the current leaders of the airport workers’ unions won’t even lift a finger in defence of the jobs of their own members who are currently under attack.

We understand that war is an integral part of the capitalist system and seek to use examples like the use of Shannon by the US military and the vindictive prosecution of Mary Kelly to expose the myth of Ireland’s “neutrality” and the futility of looking to “our” government to oppose imperialist war. Rather, it is only by becoming conscious that the Irish capitalist class has interests diametrically counterposed to those of the working class that advanced workers can be won to the perspective of building a revolutionary vanguard party to act in the interests of all the oppressed and for the overthrow of the capitalist system.
We call on opponents of the colonial occupation of Iraq to protest on the day of the sentencing hearing, Wednesday 1 December. Demonstrations have been called for Limerick Court House and at the Government Buildings in Dublin.

Mary Kelly’s supporters are asking for donations to her legal defence to be sent to: Legal Defence Fund, account number 50400007, sort code 98-60-20, Ulster Bank Ltd, Limerick. Messages of support can be sent to Mary at [email protected] or PO Box 9260, Dublin 1, Ireland.