On Thursday, the 3rd of July, Mary Kelly walked out of Kilrush Circuit Court a free woman, to the sound of the loud cheers of a crowd of delighted anti-war activists and supporters. She had been charged on two counts – trespass (by going over the perimeter fence at Shannon) and criminal damage to a U.S. Naval aircraft that had landed at Shannon for refueling. The jury found her guilty on the much less serious charge of trespass, with the judge adjourning sentencing until October. They could not, however, reach the required ten-two majority verdict on the criminal damage charge, finally stating that they had reached deadlock and that there was no prospect of reaching agreement. Despite strenuous efforts by the prosecuting counsel throughout the four-day trial to discredit the defence, a significant portion of a jury made up of ordinary members of the Irish public could not find it in their hearts to criminalise Mary Kelly.

Shannon Airport is the destination again on Saturday 21st of June for a National Demonstration called by the Cork Anti-War Campaign against the continued US Military use of the Airport. Buses are travelling from Cork and Dublin.

The demonstration will be complimented by a party/gathering called by SOS at what was previously the site of the Shannon Peace Camp and by a Catholic Worker Peace Walk. SOS have issued an open invitation for people interested in contributing to the party and in a statement and interview have outlined their novel approach.

Court cases centring on events at previous Shannon demonstrations and direct actions continue, as do efforts to raise funds for those facing charges and fines. These include a pub quiz in Dublin on Thursday 19th June, and a concert in Dublin on Tuesday 17th.

An abundance of material continues to be published on Indymedia on the subject of the ongoing war in Iraq and protests and actions in opposition to it including these audio interviews with Caoimhe Butterly, who has recently travelled there.

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One night I was woken up by a Garda, by him booting me in the ribs, because, he said, `I can't be arsed bending down and I don't like touching shit with my hands!'

My name is David and I am homeless. I was asked to write a piece on the reason for my situation and my experiences of being homeless. This is it. I am sorry if it comes across as a sob story, it isn't meant to and I am not looking for sympathy or for people to feel sorry for me. As it is things are looking up for me at last but it probably does come across that way because after a long time spent thinking about it, there aren?t many good things that I can say about it.

Contrary to popular belief homeless people haven't brought the situation on themselves and do not choose to live that way, as is the case with me. After my mother passed on, I decided that I wanted to get away from Liverpool and go back to my home country of Ireland, (having left when I was six or seven because my Mum and Dad split up, my Mum being from Liverpool she took me back to be with her parents.) as I had no family left there, being born an only child and late on in my parents life (my Father had passed on two years earlier and I had no family in Ireland either.) I had nothing to keep me there and I felt I needed a change.

Continue to the rest of the story.

Threshold has some good resources which indicate that if David were to wait for "social housing" he could wait as long as 12 years. More of this research is at Focus Ireland calls into question (pg. 126) the role that land speculation and the planning process in the provision of "social housing". As part of a response to the situation the evangelical Dominican Friars run the Merchant's Quay Project and the Simon Community and St. Vincent de Paul undertake similar work. However David can rest assured that the proper authorities have the problem in hand. As long ago as the 21st of January 2002, Minister Bobby Molloy, in a criticism of a Focus Ireland report said "[...]There is no escaping the fact that there are far too many people homeless and this Government is totally committed to dealing with the problem of homelessness. We have made considerable improvements in the way we are addressing the problem."

The G8 are returning to Europe in June after fleeing to the Rocky mountains last year in an attempt to avoid the protests that greeted them in Genoa in 2001. The G8 are effectively an unelected world government who dictate the world’s economic and political agenda through the IMF, the World Trade Organisation and the World Bank. Their neoliberal policies of war and profit are destroying the planet and its people. The G8 will meet in Evian, France from the 1st to the 3rd of June. Hundreds of thousands of protestors from all over Europe are heading there to greet them!

Globalise Resistance, an Irish activist network, is calling on all organisations and individuals to sign the call opposing the G8 and encourages people to make their way to the protests and alternative summits that will be held near Evian. Anti-G8 leaflets and trade union motions are available from GR's web pages.

Globalise Resistance is running buses to get there, and an alternative bus known as the 'Good Bus' is being discussed.

Current GR Bulletin
The 'Good Bus'

See also CLAAAC - Anti-Authoritarian and Anti-Capitalist Convergence Against the G8, ATTAC, War On Want, World Development Movement, Globalise Resistance UK, Zone Autogérée a Genève (Fr.), AntiG8.org, Evian 2003, G8Deviant.org (counter-summit planning).

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This Saturday, the 10th May, Tony Doherty, whose father Patrick was killed on Bloody Sunday, is to take part in a walk from the Bloody Sunday monument to the monthly vigil outside Raytheon, to protest the killing by US Parachuters of 13 innocent protesters in the Iraqi town of Fallujah.

The massacre, which took place on Monday April 28th outside the school that the 82nd Airborne Division were occupying, was later justified by an official US military cover story. The story claimed that soldiers had come under fire, and that they had only fired aimed shots at gunmen. The walk is organized by the Foyle Ethical Investment Campaign as part of the campaign against the arms trade and its presence in Derry, in the form of Raytheon. Continue to the complete article here

Links: Foyle Ethical Investment Campaign / Irish CND / Mairead Maguire on Raytheon / Fallujah and the Media (from Counterpoint)