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Torture, bombs and killers pass through Shannon
 international |
crime and justice |
news report
 Wednesday March 09, 2005 22:11 by Edward Horgan - Citizen of Ireland
Ireland's participation in Human Rights Abuses: A case to answer?
Abuse of human rights is serious. It sometimes happens when undemocratic regimes feel threated by freedom movements. It is happening in the so-called war on terror because democratic US is seeking to maintain its access to an undue share of the world’s limited energy resources. Ireland is facilitating this torture process, and the even worse large-scale killing of innocent people in Iraq, by facilitating the US military transit through Shannon and the transport of prisoners for torture. Ireland’s reasons for this complicity amount to the worst of all reasons, just money.
 Vulture on the wing? Irish Government agents move to suppress civil liberties and exposure of truth at Shannon.
Following my arrest at Shannon by both Airport Police and Gardai, on Friday 4th March, my binoculars and camera were impounded. I went back to Shannon on Sunday with Tim and witnessed three troop-carrying chartered aircraft in the space of less that one hour. On a further visit on Tuesday I witnessed one Gulfstream taking off and a futher one landing. Because I did not have my binoculars or camera, it was necessary for me to get out of my car in order to attempt identification of this aircraft. However, I was approached by a plain-clothes special branch detective garda, who immediately told me who I was, unlike AP Inspector Martin on Friday last, and ordered me to leave. When I hesitated he told me I would be arrested if I did not leave immediately.
Meanwhile, US troops are passing through Shannon in large numbers daily. A French TV crew arrived on Wednesday 9th and got some good footage of US troops within the terminal building at Shannon. They are over to do a programme on Irish neutrality, and have been simply gob-smacked at what is going on at Shannon.
Attached is a recent photos of a US warplane at Shannon, in case anyone might think they had “gone away you know”. These photos were taken recently at an airport near you. Meanwhile democracy and freedom are little nearer in Iraq, except for the freedom in death for 100,000 innocent people. Civil war in Iraq is historically unprecedented, but is being provoked by the US-led occupation in clasis divide and rule strategy.
In Lebanon, George Bush calls for the withdrawal of the 40,000 Syrian troops, but makes no mention of the withdrawal of 150,000 US troops from Iraq. Lebanon is just recovering from a dreadful civil war, instigaged by Israel, who activley supprted and even led the Christian Militia. Now civil war may be looming again, sparked off by fears of US and Israeli interference. The US first intervened in Lebanon in 1958 and has still not learned the lessons of history.
"By now it should be clear that decades of excusing and accommodating tyranny in the pursuit of stability have only led to injustice and instability and tragedy," Mr. Bush said on Tuesday 8th March.
Yes, Mr Bush, so please get out of all those countries you are occupying in part or in whole. Stop inflicting tyranny, injustice, instability and tragedy on millions of innocent people.
Almost 3,000 innocent people died in the attacks on the US in Sept 2001, 3000 tragedies. At least twice that number were killed in US revenge attacks on Afghanistan. So far over 100,000 innocent Iraqis have been killed even though there was no Iraqi involvement in the attacks on the US, no weapons of mass destruction, and the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein had been supported for years by the US. How come one American life comes to be equated to over 300 Muslim or Arab lives? A similar proportionality is revealed with the casualty rate in Iraq, 1400 US lives for 100,000 Iraqis, amounts to wholesale unjustified slaughter, not military combat.
Justice and truth are the values we in Ireland should be espousing, and our Irish national interests are best served by insisting on justice for all our neighbours. Humankind is now our neighbourhood.
There is an institution in Europe called the European Court of Human Rights. A case now needs to be prepared to establish if Ireland has a case to answer before the European Court of Human Rights over its failure to prevent the use of its airports and facilities for the purposes of transporting prisoners for torture by another state. If the health scandal is anything to go by, it will not be politicians’ heads that will roll, but the government’s agents, and civil servants.
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Comments (9 of 9)
Jump To Comment: 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1So now you know. And when His Unholiness George Warmonger Bush kicks off his War with Iran and Syria you'll see more War Planes on Bombing Missions and Torture Jets carrying Torture Victims. You believe in a Mercifull God. The Bushites don't. You believe in Human Rights. The Bushites don't. You believe in True Justice. The Bushites only believe in Power over People. You believe in Peace. The Bushites believe in War.
see my comments Sunday Mar 13th
http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=68866
All of the bigger actions at Shannon Airport have been discussed publicly beforehand. There was talk of disarming planes back in 2001 already (indeed someone was arrested on the airfield making his way towards a plane in December that year). It didn't compromise the actions.
There is a link between plane spotting and plane stopping at Shannon Airport. Of course there is! If there were not there would be little reason to fight for the continued right to monitor the airport. That's not to say that Ed, Tim, or any other person who monitors planes is doing it *so* someone -- violent or nonviolent -- will go into the airport at night etc... But then as citizens in an open society they needn't bother justify their reasons for photographing this or that, or writing this or that on a webpage if it's legal.
Sure, the planespotting can be used to mount political pressure -- direct actions asside -- as Tim has managed to do with a handful of others around the world to get the word out about the Gulfstream Torture Jet. But that's not all it's good for.
R. Isable, would you come join me to do something at Shannon?
My phrasing was poor -- sorry -- but I did say "from", by which I meant "starting from" there. i.e. Walk ten metres forward, cut fence, run 50m, cut fence, run 20m...
"Questioner" is just a right-wing troll. Ignore her/him.
"Activist" if you are planning some sort of action like this I find it odd that you would want to discuss it in public. I wonder are you someone trying to pretend that there's a link between taking photographs and pacifically disarming warplanes? Are you someone trying to establish the idea that public reporting (from a public place of the illegal use of Shannon civilian airport for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq) is illegal?
If you are really an "activist" having private fantasies about this then you'd be better off not talking about it in public and actually going and doing something.
Finally you say:
> [I]f a group of twenty people went airside
> (from where you took that photo)
This could be poor phrasing on your part, but you make it sound as though this photograph were taken "airside". It was not.
It's a funny thing, but a person called "Questioner", has been using "your" comment on this thread as evidence that taking photographs should be made illegal (look at the link below this comment to see his/her mendacity).
Of course, his/her argument is completely spurious as I'm sure you'll agree.
If a group of twenty people went airside (from where you took that photo) some of them could get inside the pen, and some of them could make to the warplane. The airport "police" are unarmed, and I doubt that the army would shoot if even they spotted you.
Alone breaching the bandit's pen could be worthwhile. I think it was erected as part of an agreement to keep the gun runners and war criminals from leaving for security concerns.
First though folks on the ground doing the monitoring could do with some friendly company. Get to know the place! :-)
There have been some rumblings in the corridors of injustice. A phone call from my solicitor to Shannon Garda Station, some media publicity, and lo and behold, a phone call from one of the arresting Gardai to say that my camera and binoculars were available for collection. When asked could they not deliver these impounded items to my home the reply was that this was impossible, because Limerick was a separate Garda division from Shannon. Anyway, I wanted to check out to see if there were any suspicious warplanes at Shannon, so at 7 pm on Thursday 10 March I drove to Shannon and released my camera and binos from custody.
It would appear that nothing suspicious was found in my camera, not even a film, and that my binoculars did not contain any special spying devices, or weapons of mass destruction. A trip to the airport perimeter did not reveal any weapons of mass destruction there either, and this was unusual, because on my last four random trips to the airport, there were either US military warplanes or chartered troop carriers on the ground.
A file on my case has been sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions. If they decide to prefer charges, then it will provide further opportunities to expose the truth of what is going on at Shannon. The abuse of my civil liberties may serve a small purpose in protecting human rights elsewhere. But I do wish others would take up the challenge at Shannon for a while. There is plenty of scope, and we need more constant monitoring and reporting of what is happening. We need to shine a light into the dark holes of human rights abuses, and the killings that are being perpetrated in our name are the worst of these abuses.
Hope to see some of you peace-activists in Dublin on Friday, at the Catholic Workers trial.
When will they ever learn?
Why so many Gardai guarding this Hercules? What was it carrying?
Me thinks the whole mess Mr. Bush has gotten himself and the lads into in the Middle east is what will bring an end to refuelling in Shannon,
and the American Global Empire project to boot -
AND alot quicker than redecorating supply planes with red paint and hatchets.
and no maybes.
Fair play to ye all the Same,
I will dance and sing and get extreeemeely drunk the day the US Empire finally collapses (sorry to our american cousins -its gonna be hard but its the only way), i will smile as artificially inflated stock values evaporate and the fat cat capitalists run for the hills, leaving empty bank vaults in their wake. i will howl with unashamed glee as dollars are burned in great worthless piles, and i will cheer for all those young damaged men going home from the deserts of the middle east to their loved ones at last.
but the next day,
get this:
theres going to be some hangover!#
For all you Activists , i hope you are prepared for the Reality of what it is you are struggling to bring about.
And get decent lawyers, theres nothing to be gained from going to jail in this day and age.
It shouldn't surprise anyone I guess. There have always been people in Ireland who have collaborated with foreign imperial power to feather their nests with skulls and bones while at the same time being "dead against da war". It's the economy stupid -- that's what their favourite American since Kennedy said. And like JFK, he was a ruthless mass murderer.
Rotten as Washington may be right now, Ed's right, we've got to focus on our own doorstep where the planes refuel still every day. A sustained campaign of nonviolent direct action, plus court actions and outreach, could stop the refueling in just a few years or months even if lucky.
At the Ploughshares support gig 'American Voices Against The War' someone in the audience mentioned something so obvious I never thought of it before.
America has hundreds of military bases all over the world - some not actually called 'bases,' such as Shannon Airport.
If America is not an Empire, then how many military bases from other countries are within the borders of the United States of America?
hmmmm, makes ya think.
For those coming indymedia.ie to see Ploughshares Trial info and who may not know who Ed Horgan is, check out the following link. One of my personal favourites of photo series that I've done...
Retired Army Commandant Ed Horgan
http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=61352