Indymedia.ie tops 120,000 visitors in July

July was another record breaking month for Indymedia Ireland. On Tuesday July 26th, we surpassed the 3 million hits mark for site traffic in a month for the first time ever. Over the month we averaged 115,000 hits a day - an increase of a whopping 30,000 a day on our previous all time record which was last month (June 2005). Web traffic normally drops off substantially over the Summer, so this performance is a testament to the increasing quality of contributions to the newswire and our making inroads into broader audiences.

Although we don't normally retain IP addresses (to help enhance user privacy) statistical analysis of the samples that were retained in the past show that we will have received over 120,000 different readers in July alone (measured by unique IP addresses) . 1.1 million pages on the site and 3.55 million files were downloaded. In less technical terms, we are doing very, very well indeed. In more paranoid terms, we are transitioning from being a mosquito to being a serious pest in the house of Herr McDowell and chairman Bertie. Not bad for a bunch of volunteers organised as a collective with a budget that might as well not exist.

So, what does all this mean then? If you publish a story on the Indymedia Ireland newswire, it will be seen by many more people than you probably imagine. We must admit we are pleased with these readership figures, but we are constantly looking for ways to improve the site, and expand into other media beyond the internet. We always need more people to get involved in operating the Indymedia Ireland machine.

After the scandals with GAMA and Irish Ferries, Tesco are the latest employers to have been reported to be exploiting foreign workers in Ireland. On Thursday afternoon, temporary agency workers from Poland organising as "Committee of Defence of Temp Workers in Tesco" staged a picket outside their workplace in Greenhills while other workers inside temporarily downed tools in a solidarity strike.

Their main grievance is that they are continually being asked to meet higher productivity levels. The levels currently being demanded by management present a danger to the health of the workers. The start of these demands on the workforce came soon after the entry of Poland into the EU and more Polish workers were hired by Tesco through temping agencies. Tesco is taking unfair advantage of workers coming from Poland who are unaware of their rights as employees and who are at first grateful to get a job which pays more than they would get at home.

As the workers are temporary, they can be just let go if they fail to meet these ever-increasing targets. Due to the new targets being unsustainable, there has been much dissatisfaction among the workforce. Two Polish workers who were vocally expressing this dissent found themselves fired for their efforts. Along with the demand that productivity targets be reduced to a manageable level, the workers are demanding that the two employees who were laid off have their jobs reinstated and that agency temps who work for longer than 3 months should get a permanent contract from Tesco with all the associated benefits.

Audio Interviews With Protesters at Greenhills, Tesco Distribution Centre
Related Story On Indymedia Polska

Related Indymedia Ireland Articles:
Some Information On Companies Exploiting Workers In Ireland
Stand Up For Your Rights Campaign
Joe Higgins' Challenge to Irish Trade Unions: Protect Migrant Workers

The leadership of Oglaigh na hEireann has formally ordered an end to the armed campaign. This will take effect from 4pm this afternoon.

All IRA units have been ordered to dump arms.

All Volunteers have been instructed to assist the development of purely political and democratic programmes through exclusively peaceful means.

Volunteers must not engage in any other activities whatsoever.

The IRA leadership has also authorised our representative to engage with the IICD [Independent International Commission on Decommissioning] to complete the process to verifiably put its arms beyond use in a way which will further enhance public confidence and to conclude this as quickly as possible.

The brutal physics of modern traffic was borne in on me in a raw way standing by the busy Navan road just north of Tara yesterday evening for an hour while the latest protest against the proposed new motorway was in progress. This is an experience you don’t get driving along in your Toyota Corolla.

"What is your name and where are you from?" a policeman asked me when I rolled down my window at a checkpoint on the Kingscourt Road out of Navan last night.

"Sean Crudden from Jenkinstown, Dundalk," I replied fearlessly.
Garda: "Where are you coming from?"
SC: "From Navan - or rather from Maynooth."
Garda: "What were you doing in Navan."
SC: "I was at a protest against the new road."
Garda: "Were you protesting?"
SC: "I wouldn’t say I was protesting exactly - but I was there,"
I said with some trepidation.
Garda: "What were you doing there then?"
SC: "I was with my son. He helped publicise the protest."

"Well I disagree strongly with the protest," the policeman opined and the atmosphere thawed.

From Elaine and Ciaran on the newswire:The point blank killing of Jean Charles de Menezes, the lack of charging or even suspension of those who killed him (1 shot to the shoulder, 7 to the head) and the New Labour rationalizations that lay a basis for more of these killings to come redefine what is considered as acceptable collateral damage in this war. Blair has decided that these Judge Dredd scenes are part of the price 'we' are willing to pay for his war on Iraq. Meanwhile, the Ahern led government has made us morally culpable in the indiscriminate killings in the U.S invasions of Iraq & Afghanistan and have of course transformed Shannon Airport, hosting 25,000 U.S. troops a month, into a soft and significant target.

The absence of a courageous and nonviolently militant anti-war movement in the imperial centres enhances a vacuum for the pathetic mimicry of the fundamentalist warriors as they bring the war home to London. Whether these attacks and the state's post-attack prepackaged scenarios of expanding police powers (they want to increase the time they can detain a suspect without charge from 14 days to 3 months) and reduced liberties lead to the death of active citizenship remains to be seen. The pressures on the Muslim community, once active in the anti-war movement, to internally migrate and depoliticize will be massive.

More Indymedia Ireland Coverage Of The Death Of De Menezes:
Police shoot man dead on London Tube. "suspicious"
Bertie Ahern says: Al-Qaeda watched 'closely' - Shannon not Al-Qaeda Fly Trap

...And Of The Pitstop Ploughshares:
Pit Stop Ploughshares Head to Oct. 24th. Trial- Update & Call for Solidarity!