Category: Human Rights
CÚPLA MÍLE PROTESTORS RATHER THAN MÍLE FÁILTE FOR TRUMP’S VISIT
Diarmuid Breatnach
Ireland has broken off its love affair with the USA but the breakup’s been coming for a long time. Of course it was always a kind of mythical USA that was the love object, of film stars, rock n’ roll, friendly presidents, Irish-U.Stater politicians, of U.Stater tourists – never the real USA, good or bad. One could feel the tensions in the relationship during the Viet Nam War, though that was mostly to be seen in the youth and some lefties. But then came the lying scandals in the US Presidency of Nixon and Clinton and the naked warmongering throughout all, including the Bushes, Snr. and Jnr.
Ireland, below the level of its Gombeen politicians, has split up with the USA (at the level of ITS politicians and millionaires [often the same thing]) but it has been a relatively civilised breakup and thankfully with no children (well, apart from the Irish illegal immigrants – sorry, undocumented visitors).
While some businesses in an Dún Beag might have turned a profit out the Fear Mór’s visit, having the Chief of the World Superpower drop in on us has cost us – around 10 million euro, according to the Irish Independent. Loads of extra Gardaí on the ground in Co. Clare and Limerick, in the air and on sea, does not come cheap (though I’m sure the overtime was welcome). All would have been bad enough if we had invited him but we hadn’t. Will the Irish Government present the US Presidency with an itemised bill? Probably not.
(Photo: D. Breatnach)
At the invitation of The Irish Examiner, a number of organisations and individuals had written letters to Trump for publication (see link below); most were critical and these included Amnesty International, Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, National Union of Journalists, National Women’s Council of Ireland, National Union of Students; Brendan Ogle, Tara Flynn and Clare Daly. For entertainment value I’d pick out the IPSC’s and Tara Flynn’s (well, she is a comedian). The ICCL also had a newspaper advertisement criticising Trump, which was sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union and figured logos of a number of other civil rights organisations.
There were protests in various parts of the country, including one to greet his arrival at Shannon airport (hopefully US munitions and troop carriers were pulled to one side so as not to hinder his landing). The Irish Times said there were about 200 protesters there so, on past reporting, there could have been anything between 300 and 1,000. It is not easy to get to Shannon airport unless one has a car, even from Galway the gaps between bus arrival times are substantial. And no train station.
DUBLIN RALLY
Dublin had a showy and packed anti-Trump rally, with a Baby Trump blimp floating above the crowd outside the Garden of Remembrance. An activist brought big letter placards which, with the help of volunteers from the crowd, spelled out anti-trump messages in English and in Irish. Indeed an interesting feature was a number of placards partly or completely in Irish.
The theme of “welcome” or “fáilte” was of course played upon in reverse, in speech and placard, with more than a hinted reference to the old Bord Fáilte slogan inviting tourists to the land of “céad míle fáilte”.
The event was managed by Unite Against Racism which is, for the most part, People Before Profit, which in turn is really the Socialist Workers’ Party. A number of other left-wing party flags could be seen too. A group of Shinners were at the rally with their trademark flags (never go anywhere without the party’s flag) but no “dissidents” were present as a group, though I certainly noted some as individuals.
The speakers at the rally covered a number of themes, including of course misogyny, migrants, Palestine, war-making and imperialism. Liam Herrick of the ICCL was an unusual sight to see on an outdoors protest platform, speaking at the second part of the rally. Curiously, the rally organisers had sent a major part of the attendance off to march around the city centre for awhile and of course, when they got back, they had shed a great part of their numbers. A torrential downpour no doubt encouraged the desertions.
Coming towards the end of the rally, a performer accompanied himself on guitar while he rendered some songs for the diminished attendance. Woody Guthrie’s “Plane Crash at Los Gatos” (also known as “Deportees”) would have been an apposite choice, a song about Mexican labourers being employed in the south-eastern US fruit harvests and then driven back across the Border. Guthrie was moved to sing about them when in 1948 a plane carrying mostly deported Mexicans crashed, killing all on board and though the names of the crew were given in the news reports, the Mexicans were referred to only as “deportees”.
At the rally, eventually Trump was deflated (the blimp, I mean), tethering weight bags emptied of water, placards were packed, flags furled …. and I went to get some shopping.
End.
REFERENCES AND FURTHER INFORMATION:
45th ANNIVERSARY OF DUBLIN & MONAGHAN BOMBING — STILL NO JUSTICE
(Reading time main text: up to 15 minutes)
Diarmuid Breatnach
Forty-five years after the highest violent loss of life of any day in the Thirty-Years War in Ireland, survivors and relatives of victims of the Dublin and Monaghan bombing seem no nearer achieving justice. The identities of some of the Loyalist terrorists were known quite quickly after the bombing by Irish Army Intelligence and Garda Special Branch; British Intelligence penetration of some Irish State agencies had already been claimed by Irish Army intelligence and not long afterwards, Commissioner Ned Garvey was exposed as a British agent by a disgruntled British intelligence operative. Yet no arrests by the Royal Ulster Constabulary, no arrest warrants issued by the Irish Government and – incredibly – remains of bomb material were sent by Garvey’s superior to the British colony authorities for analysis. And consecutive British Governments refuse to hand over the relevant files or to disclose their contents.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
45th ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATION IN DUBLIN
A crowd had gathered at the Dublin and Monaghan Bombings Monument in Talbot Street for some time before the event was due to start on the 17th May. Aidan Shields, whose mother Maureen was killed in in Talbot Street, acted as the master of ceremonies and, after saying a few words about the bombings and the campaign, outlined the course the proceedings would follow, apologising also to those who had to stand in the rain.
Irish Minister for Justice Charlie Flanagan spoke about the bombings and about the efforts he had made, on behalf of the Government, to have the British Government lift their embargo on the relevant files. He also used the opportunity to criticise by implication the armed Republican resistance in the British colony and to promote the Good Friday Agreement, seeking collaboration between different political parties in running the Six Counties, i.e the British colony. Although he said he shared the relatives’ frustration at the British Government still not disclosing the information about the bombing in their files, not once did he condemn them, nor criticise successive British governments, British Intelligence nor the administration of the colony and its police force.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
The Mayor of Dublin Niall Ring and Cathaoirleach of Monaghan Council, David Maxwell, also spoke at the event.
It was left to Noel Hegarty, a survivor of the bombing, in a poem (see References) and Pat Savage in his Song for Derek (which I’ve been unable to find on line) to place the blame for the attack and the lack of progress where it belonged.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
Julieann Campbell, author and Derry Bloody Sunday relative – her uncle John Duddy was the first fatal victim of the Paratroopers on that day in 1972 — gave the oration for the ceremony. She talked about the loss through sudden death, the effect on relatives and how it is exacerbated when official lies are told about the deaths with secrecy used to make it harder for the relatives and survivors to get at the truth. She referred to one British file on Bloody Sunday that is embargoed for decades yet and turned to Minister Flanagan, asking him publicly to press the British for the release of that file also, a request which was applauded by the crowd.
Rachel Hegarty read one of her sonnets from her collection, May Day 1974, which she composed based on witness testimonies about the deceased and Ciarán Warfield performed a song about the bombing and the lack of justice obtained. Fr. Tom Clowe led those who wished to respond in a Christian prayer (the Rev. Trevor Sargent had injured himself the day before and was unable to attend). Cormac Breatnach played low whistle while floral wreaths were laid and again at the conclusion of the event.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
THE BOMBING 45 YEARS AGO – THREE BOMBS IN DUBLIN AND ONE IN MONAGHAN
What might be considered the official Dublin City centre is the area surrounding O’Connel Street, just north of the river Liffey. The street runs north-south and is bisected at its middle by a thoroughfare running east-west. The eastern part is mostly Talbot Street, with a short continuation named North Earl Street. Crossing over O’Connell Street one now passes by the Spire, where once stood Nelson’s Column (until blown up by dissident Republicans in 1966) and continuing westward, one enters Henry Street. This street contains big stores such as Debenhams and Arnotts and is a higher-class shopping street than are the streets chosen to place two bombs, Talbot Street; could it have been decided that predominantly working and lower-middle class victims were less likely to create pressure on the Irish Government to find those responsible? The other bomb’s target street, Parnell, is also not one of high-end shopping.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
There had been previous Loyalist bombings in Dublin, for example of the Wolfe Tone Monument in Stephens Green and the O’Connell Monument in Glasnevin Cemetery. None of those had caused deaths but a bombing in 1972 had killed a public transport worker and another, in 1973, had killed two and injured 185. No arrests were made in connection with either and in fact the Fianna Fáil government blamed Irish Republicans for the ’72 bombing, using the emotions engendered to push through more repressive legislation. That was an Amendment to the Offences Against the State Act, one which allowed the State to jail people on a charge of belonging to an illegal organisation, without any evidence other than the word of a Garda of Superintendent rank or higher and is regularly used to convict people today.
On the 17th May 1974 four bombs exploded in Dublin and Monaghan – killing 33 people including a woman who was nine months pregnant.
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Three car bombs exploded without warning in the capital shortly before 5.30pm on Friday 17 May 1974.
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Two of the bombs went off on Talbot and Parnell Streets before a third blast exploded on South Leinster Street near Trinity College, 27 people died.
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Shortly afterwards another bomb exploded outside a pub in Monaghan, killing seven people. Hundreds more were injured.
(Photo source: Internet)
After the bombings, the most concrete result in Irish Government policy was that Irish Republicans being sought by the British began to be tried in the Irish State. The Criminal Law (Jurisdiction) Act 1976 allowed trial in the Republic for alleged crimes committed in the Six Counties, and vice versa, which facilitated Irish State cooperation with the British State against Republicans, overcoming the many failures in extradition cases up to that date.
This parallels somewhat the 1980s GAL terrorist campaign waged by the Spanish Government against Basque independentists in the northern Basque Country, part of the French State’s territory. After Spanish State-sponsored terrorist shootings and bombings of independentist Basques for some time on what it considers French soil, the French Government began to extradite refugees to the Spanish State. However it was 1984 before the Irish State actually extradited a Republican to the Six Counties, with the extradition of Dominic McGlinchey (who subsequently had his conviction overturned there). It is curious that this possible rationale for the Dublin/ Monaghan bombings does not seem to have been considered – after all, the 1972 bombings by British agents had resulted in a change in Irish law to the disadvantage of Republicans within the Irish State.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
The Justice for the Forgotten campaign organises an annual commemoration on the date of the bombings but internationally and perhaps even in Ireland, this massacre is the least-known of all that took place during the recent 30 Years War. Arguably this is because a) the bombs were not placed by the IRA and the massacre was not therefore of much use in propaganda against them; b) the victims were mostly Irish and/or c) the perpetrators were Loyalists and British Intelligence operatives working together.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
SECRETS AND AVOIDANCE
It is interesting how coyly the media treat the whole question of British collusion with Loyalist death squads, including the Glenanne Gang’s involvement in the Dublin-Monaghan bombings, along with Irish State‘s lack of energy in pursuing the matter, including possible collusion and certain secrecy. There are sometimes ‘suspicions’, ‘concerns’, ‘inferences’, ‘allegations’ ….
And yet most of these matters are beyond speculation, established as facts through a number of different sources. Contrast that with how happy the media are to label the tragic but accidental shooting dead of Lyra McKee as a “murder”, even though legally and in fact, murder can only be when someone intends to kill the victim – which not even the press in its greatest hysteria has tried to suggest was the case.
The Justice for the Forgotten campaign has taken a civil case against the British State which appears to be playing its usual delaying game in situations like this. On 17th April they were due to respond to questions of the campaign’s lawyers but did not do so until eight days later, which resulted in the campaign’s lawyers not being able to proceed at the Belfast High Court on May 1st ….. The relatives will now have to wait until September.
The lack of energy and firmness in pursuing the issues and the disclosure of British files is not the only evidence of the Irish State’s lack of interest. It is also the case that much of the funding for the Justice for the Forgotten campaign was removed by the Irish Government some years ago; the campaign was obliged to leave its Gardiner Street office and remove much of their equipment and files to a portakabin in a supporter’s back garden.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
The British are not the only ones sitting on secret files. Mrs. O’Neill had called on Leo Varadkar to release the files deposited by the McEntee Commission, which was charged with investigating the Garda inquiry of the time, an inquiry which has been heavily criticised over the years. “I personally ask the Taoiseach to consider this reasonable and fair request,” she had said. Martha O’Neill’s husband, Eddie, was killed in the bombing and her sons Billy, then aged seven and Eddie jnr. aged five, were badly injured but survived.
Last year, Fred Holroyd, a British Army Intelligence officer who was the liaison with the RUC for a number of years during part of the three decades of war in the Six Counties, offered to give evidence on British involvement in the bombings – but in a secret court. Holroyd is suing the British Ministry of Defence over sacking him and has spoken out about collusion between the British administration and Loyalist paramilitaries including those widely believed to be the Loyalist bombers responsible for the carnage on the 17th May 1974.
Another measure of the Irish Government’s lack of enthusiasm for going after the perpetrators of the bombings and their handlers can be seen in the fact that the first documentary to be made about the atrocity in the Irish capital city and Monaghan town, was made not by the State broadcaster, RTÉ but by the English company First Tuesday, Yorkshire TV. “Hidden Hand – The Forgotten Massacre” was broadcast on 6 July 1993. Not everyone who had TV in the state then had ITV – I believe it required a special aerial at the time – and if memory serves me correctly, Yorkshire TV offered simultaneous screening to RTÉ, which it declined. The program made a case that the British Army, the RUC and Loyalist paramilitaries could have been involved in a number of killings, including the Dublin-Monaghan bombings.
The failure of the Irish Government at the time to pursue the case energetically and in a correct manner was responsible for much more than leaving the injured and the the relatives of 33 murdered people without justice. It also left the Glenanne Gang, a Loyalist paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force death squad that included serving members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary police force and the British Army’s Ulster Defence Force, free to carry out around another 120 sectarian murders in the Six Counties.
Year after year, the Dublin/ Monaghan commemoration is held and year after year, relatives call for truth and justice; the Irish politicians express regrets and say that they will ask the British Government for the files again, to be refused again. And there it is left, until the following anniversary.
End.
REFERENCES AND FURTHER INFORMATION:
Justice for the Forgotten campaign: http://www.dublinmonaghanbombings.org/home/
and https://www.facebook.com/Justice4theForgotten1974/
Holroyd: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48303360
Coy Irish Times reporting: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/government-presses-for-action-over-dublin-monaghan-bombings-1.3895839
1972 & 1973 Dublin bombings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_and_1973_Dublin_bombings
Hidden Hand TV documentary film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr_wdPwipgQ
Noel Hegarty poem: http://www.dublinmonaghanbombings.org/poem6.html
THE GREAT HUNGER COMMEMORATED IN SLIGO, DUBLIN AND CELTIC PARK
AN GORTA MÓR COMMEMORATED IN SLIGO, DUBLIN AND CELTIC PARK
(Reading time of article text: 5 minutes)
Clive Sulish
A small crowd gathered at the Garden of Remembrance, Dublin on Sunday afternoon to commemorate the Great Hunger, an Gorta Mór on National Famine Day. Led by a lone piper, they marched through O’Connell St., the city’s main street, some of them in period costume, to the Great Hunger Memorial on the Custom House Quay, North Dock and later on to the iconic sailing ship, the Jeannie Johnson.
With some adults and children dressed in period clothes, some of them tattered to represent the destitution of the starving poor, they marched down O’Connell Street led by the lone piper and turned left at the Bridge, proceeding along to Custom Quay’s North Dock and the Great Hunger memorial. There they were addressed by Michael Blanch of the organising committee and by Niall Ring, Lord Mayor (coming to the end of his year in that role), who had accompanied them from the Garden of Remembrance.
Some sentences in Irish were spoken by the MC of the event and by the Lord Mayor, while Michael Blanch referenced the deadly impact the Great Hunger had on the Irish language (i.e with the depopulation of the main Irish-speaking areas of the western seaboard). The Irish Tricolour came in for a mention in the Dublin commemoration also; it had been presented to William Smith O’Brien by women in Paris during the revolution there of 1848 and the Young Irelanders had staged their own uprising that year also, small and certainly too late, easily crushed by the British colonial forces. The huge Irish diaspora was also mostly a result of the Great Hunger and had contributed significantly to the formation and membership of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, also known as the Fenians, founded simultaneously in 1858 on St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin and in New York. The IRB, in turn, had been the main driving force behind the 1916 Rising.
Tourists and other passers-by stopped to watch as wreaths were laid on on the statues of the monument and an Irish-language version of Amazing Grace was sung by a young girl in period costume. A currach (small traditional Irish sea-craft), containing a woman and two young girls in period costume and rowed by a man, pulled into place on the Liffey across from the group; one of the girls placed a wreath in a cardboard box into the river, to commemorate the Irish diaspora and those who had perished during their journeys. Participants then threw single red roses bouquets into the river also and floral wreaths were deposited around the statues of the 1977 memorial by sculptor Rowan Gillespie. And the piper played a lament, Hector the Hero.
The gathering moved on then to the sailing ship the Jeannie Johnson, to hear Evelyn Campbell sing her Famine Song and Diarmuid Breatnach sing Skibereen and Fields of Athenry. After that, some repaired to the Teachers’ Club, where tea, sandwiches, gur cake and biscuits were on offer. By coincidence, a Musical Society were relaxing there too and it was not long before songs from different parts of the world were being exchanged from different parts of the room.
THE CAMPAIGN FOR A NATIONAL IRISH FAMINE DAY
The Great Hunger is the preferred term in English by many for the terrible disaster that struck Ireland in the mid-19th Century, for people starved alongside what was for a while at least, an abundance of food.
For three successive years, a fungus-like oomycete infested the potato crop, staple diet of most of the population. Although Phytophthora infestans had attacked the potato crops on the European mainland and in Britain also, nowhere was the disaster of the dimensions it grew to in Ireland: nowhere else were the the majority of the population obliged to sustain themselves on the potato while yielding up every other edible product (except perhaps milk) to pay the landlord’s rent on land conquered from the ancestors of the starving, thousands of soldiers and police being on hand to ensure the hungry paid up. “The Almighty indeed sent the potato blight”, wrote Young Irelander journalist John Mitchell, “but the English created the Famine.”
Well over one million Irish starved or died of attendant diseases in less than five years during the reign of Queen Victoria, while ships left Irish ports laden with food and grain was fermented to make lucrative whiskey and beer. Another million emigrated and it is estimated that about one third of those also died – of drowning, of disease aboard ship or of the various dangers migrants faced. Five years after the potato crop failed, estimates put the population of Ireland at around six million, from the over 8 million of before. Over the next decade, another million would leave, paid to go, lied to go, forced to go, or gone out of desperation and loss of faith in any future in the country of their birth under foreign domination.
In 2008 it was agreed by the Irish Government that there would be a national Famine Day in the Irish calendar of national events and it would take place on the third Sunday in May. The State commemoration this year was held in Sligo, attended by Leo Varadkar (who was met by a protest of the Sligo Women’s Cervical Smear Action Group). The ceremony was covered in the RTÉ news which was shown on TV in the Teacher’s Club. Michael Blanch told those present that the campaign he and his wife had started in 2004 through the Committee for the Commemoration of Irish Famine Victims, had resulted in this national event and that it was also being commemorated by the Glasgow Celtic team in the special jerseys they wore that day (in their Scottish Premiership win 2-1 against Hearts). The symbol is black and white which are the colours of the Commemoration and he had also wanted GAA teams playing on this day to wear it on their jerseys (the Munster Hurling Championship match between Limerick and Cork was also being shown that afternoon on the TV screen in the Teachers’ Club).
End.
REFERENCES AND LINKS FOR FURTHER INFORMATION
Celtic game on Sunday: https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/48242024
Celtic FC wearing Famine Commemoration logo on their jerseys on 19th May 2019: http://www.celticfc.net/news/16184
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Famine_Commemoration_Day
Presentation by Michael Blanch at the Oireachtas in support of a National Annual Famine Commemoration Day: https://data.oireachtas.ie/ie/oireachtas/committee/dail/32/joint_committee_on_culture_heritage_and_the_gaeltacht/submissions/2018/2018-11-28_opening-statement-michael-blanch-chairman-committee-for-commemoration-of-irish-famine-victims_en.pdf
Sligo National Irish Famine Day commemoration event: https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2019/0518/1050300-national-famine-commemoration/
Talk: “Struggle Against Racism & Fascism In The 21st Century”
Diarmuid Breatnach
(Report reading time: 3 minutes)
The above was the title of an event as part of the James Connolly Festival 2019 and was held in the Bohemians FC Members’ Bar in Dalymount Park, Phibsborough, Dublin on 7th May. The event was chaired by Spark Podcast and had three speakers, one from a Direct Provision asylum seeker’s hostel, another from a Brazilian immigrant community and a third from Kerala state in India but resident in Ireland.
The first speaker was Bulelani Mfaco who introduced himself as a South African, gay and an asylum seeker. Speaking about racism, he said that it was necessary to stand up to it and quoted the example several times of Mary Manning, who was one of eleven strikers (“Ten Young Women and One Young Man”, song by Ewan McColl) in Dunne’s Stores in Dublin in pursuance of their union’s policy (IDATU) not to handle South African goods while the white racist regime was in power.
Bulelani said that fascists mean what the say in their threats about their targets, blacks, gays, asylum seekers, women who won’t act as the fascist think they should …. and so they should be prevented from coming to power. He said that as a black man he is aware of racism often on the street.
Speaking about the conditions of asylum seekers and the conditions imposed on them, including being asked to prove that he was gay (!!!), he said they do not come as freeloaders but are prevented from working while their cases are examined, which can take years, therefore the Government’s system forces them to be recipients of aid. Once a judgement is given, which in 9 out of 10 cases is a rejection of the application to stay, they can appeal and racists say they are just doing that to delay the process of their expulsion. In reality, many cases are successful on appeal as the reasons stated for rejection at the first stage were so irrational.
He also pointed out that seeking asylum has no necessary link to war but is about a person “having a reasonable fear of persecution because of their race, religion, nationality, membership of a social group or political opinion and is expelled or chooses to leave their country because of one of those factors”. A “social group” under threat could mean and often does, being one lesbian, bisexual, gay or transgender.
Eloquent and with wide knowledge about people seeking asylum in different countries, Bulelani was at times in danger of leaving the other speakers without enough time for their own contributions.
Rafaela Ferracuti (Brazilian Left Front) spoke about the fascist and racist policies of the current regime in Brazil and the harmful reforms of workers rights’ and open justification of attacks on indigenous people. Ferracuti spoke also about the situation of Brazilian migrants working in Ireland and referred to a fairly recent attack on some of them by Travellers. Asking for people to support Brazilian workers here, Rafaela also spoke about links with the Workers’ Party (which I assumed incorrectly at the time to be a generic term or a Brazilian party I had not heard of).
Manoj Mannath (of Kranthi organisation) talked about the slow climbing to power in an Indian state of a fascist party and talked about the process they had followed to do so, using Hindu religion in a supremacist way and also targeting those of the “untouchable” (sic) class.
Both Ferracuti and Mannath were speaking with difficulty in a language other than their own and I found it quite hard to follow them at times.
During questions and contributions, the following points were made or clarified:
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The attack on Portuguese migrants by Travelers was wrong but some of the response by Portuguese migrants had been to leave racist graffiti, which would not help matters.
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Irish Travelers are or have been for a long time the most discriminated-against section of Irish society with hard living conditions and high infant mortality and as often happens with people pushed to the bottom, some of them have turned to drugs and feuds are breaking out between rival gangs.
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One person opined that the Government does not want to stop immigration but to control it and keep migrants insecure and with little rights, the easier to exploit them. The trade unions should recruit migrants to help them and also to prevent them being used as cheap labour to undermine any conditions won by Irish workers.
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The Irish have been migrants to many countries and some had joined the oppressors while others became prominent in workers’ resistance.
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Another ascertained that Rafaela had been referring to the Irish organisation the Workers’ Party and she stated that it is an anti-immigration party.
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Another contribution stated that as well as the work of attacking racist policies and statements, fascists had to be prevented from establishing themselves and referred to the prevention in Dublin a few years ago of the launch of Pegida, a Europe-wide fascist organisation targeting Muslims. The Irish and Polish components had been physically prevented from holding their rally and anti-fascists are currently being taken through the courts on serious charges. He felt that these people should be supported.
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Yet another responded that although that action was good, when one got to that stage, it was already too late.
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The use of religion to divide people in India was compared to its use by the British occupation in Ireland but also by the same British colonisers in India and in some other lands.
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Another said that the real target of fascists was the indigenous mass of people and that the other targets were being put up as diversions. As the economic situation worsens, the capitalists need to suppress the struggles of the working class and sections are targeted in order to divide the opposition.
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There was general agreement that the various targeted sectors and the Irish working people needed to support one another.
The James Connolly Festival is an annual week-long event of talks on political events and sometimes cultural performances organised in the month of May in Dublin by the Communist Party of Ireland and open to the public. There is a program of other events continuing every day until Sunday: http://jamesconnollyfestival.com/#about
COMMENT:
Overall, I felt quite disappointed. I had assumed the talks and the meeting would concentrate on the practical and ideological struggle against fascism and the rise of the far-right in Ireland and perhaps in Europe, with some lessons from further afield. Or possibly even on concrete actions that might be taken to support asylum seekers. Perhaps that was an unwarranted assumption but in any case, apart from the contribution of Bulelani Mfaco, the South African asylum seeker, the examples (as far as I could understand them), though of interest, seemed to have little direct relevance to the struggle here in Ireland.
End.
CELEBRATED PALESTINIAN CARTOONIST EXHIBITS IN IRISH CITIES
(Lots of images but text reading time less than 5 minutes)
Diarmuid Breatnach
As Palestinians and their supporters around the world mark anniversaries of the Return to Palestine demonstrations and Land Day, Israeli snipers kill Palestinian children. Dublin marks the day with a solidarity rally and exhibitions and talks by internationally-recognised Palestinian cartoonist Mohammad Saba’aneh.
The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign organised a rally to mark the anniversary of the start of the Return to Palestine demonstrations last year and also Land Day. Sadly, marking a Palestinian anniversary usually involves marking the deaths of martyrs and this was no exception, as Israeli Occupation Force snipers killed four demonstrators, three of them 17 years of age.
After the rally, of which I just caught the tail end because of the weekly Save Moore Street From Demolition campaign duty, I managed to catch the exhibition of noted Palestinian political cartoonist Mohammad Saba’aneh and to buy his book PALESTINE in black and white. Sadly, a prior appointment meant I had to miss his talk, which I would have loved to attend, especially as I dabble a little in cartoon-drawing myself.
Fortunately, Mohammad Saba’aneh was still there and was kind enough to autograph his book for me. When I took a photo of him with Fatin Al Tamimi, photographer and Chairperson of the IPSC, she insisted on taking a photo of me with him too – shukran.
On Thursday, Saba’aneh had also given a talk at the National College of Art & Design, along with Tuqa Al Saraj, also a Palestinian artist but today based in Dublin.
Mohammad Saba’aneh was born in 1978 in Ramallah in occupied Palestine, where he still lives. He is a Palestinian painter and caricaturist who has been imprisoned by Israel because of his art. He has a daily cartoon in the Palestinian newspaper al-Hayat al-Jadida and his work features in publications across the Arab world.
HELPING THE DEAF AND THE TRAUMATISED WITH CARTOONS
Saba’aneh used caricature with deaf students to help them adopt another language to express their feelings and with children who witnessed an Israeli assault to help them psychologically. He took part in many workshops designed for children to develop critical thinking. Saba’aneh was responsible for organizing an international fair at Mahmoud Darwish museum in 2014 in which more than 100 international artists participated. Freedom House chose one of his works in 2016 as one of the year’s most important photos. His first book was published in the US in April 2017.
INTERNATIONAL WORK AND RECOGNITION
Saba’aneh is the Middle East representative for Cartoonist Rights Network International and the Palestinian ambassador for United Sketches, an international association for freedom of expression and cartoonists in exile and participated in many international publications such as The truth has more than one face in Europe and Sketch of Freedom in the US. He. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2017 Marseille International Cartoon Festival Prix d’Or. Pulitzer–winning cartoonist Matt Wuerker described him as “an inspiration for cartoonists around the world.” Noted graphic journalist Joe Sacco has said of this work that it is a “gut punch that gets straight to the essence of the stark reality of Palestinian life under Israeli occupation.”
PROGRAM DATES:
Thursday 28th March – NCAD (Dublin), 7pm, Harry Clarke Lecture Theatre
Friday 29th March – TCD (Dublin), 3pm, Room LTEE1, Hamilton Building
Saturday 30th March – Dublin, 2.30pm, The Pearse Centre, 27 Pearse St
All of the above now over.
Monday 1st April – Waterford, 7.30pm, The Tower Hotel
Tuesday 2nd April – Limerick, 8pm, Perys Hotel
Wednesday 3rd April – Galway, 7pm, Black Gate Cultural Centre
Thursday 4th April – Maynooth University, 4pm, Venue TBC (Afternoon)
Thursday 4th April – Celbridge, 8pm, Celbridge Manor Hotel
End.
SOURCES:
Background information: Wikipedia and IPSC FB page
Photos (unless otherwise indicated): D.Breatnach
LINKS:
IPSC: https://www.facebook.com/groups/20826333992/
FASCIST HORROR IN WESTERN SPAIN
A brief account of the fascist horror between Cantalpino and Villoruela (Salamanca) during the Spanish War, forwarded to me for translation from Castillian (Spanish). I will post the original separately.
Diarmuid Breatnach
Comment: If another reason were ever needed to ensure we crush fascism before it gets strong! Stories like this illustrate how fascism was not defeated, much less rooted out in the Spanish State and remains at its heart to this day. No progress can be made towards democracy in that state without taking that fact into account. DB.
(Translator’s note: Villoruela is a municipality located in the province of Salamanca, Castille and León, in western Spain).
Fear ravaged Cantalpino, where the Falangist hordes killed a woman and 22 men; where they robbed and raped. Mrs. Alejandra tells the story and her eyes seem to look inside herself: “They murdered many here and Eladia Pérez, the Jaboneta, too. They went looking for her son Guillermo, whom they “took for a walk” later, and she did not want to open for them; so the bastards shot and killed her; then they took her to the cemetery and her body did not fit in the hole and the bastards cut off her head with the shovel … the murderers were people from the town and strangers, Falangists, priests, friars and that kind. The priest was the worst, he gave his blessing to the “walks” .. They also cut the hair of about a hundred women to the scalp and, in the rain and everything, they took them in procession, the music playing and the Falangists shouting “Up Spain!” and “Long live Franco!” and … I shit on the mother who gave birth to them! “
Alejandra continues with her story: “… they did a lot to me, they raped others. Five Falangists raped me. They took my husband out of bed, may the poor man rest in peace, and they pushed a pistol against him, in the chest, and there, in front of him, they raped me. Some had me by the arms and others, by the legs, and here, Saint Ines, to what they wanted to do, and the guns on the bed in the presence of my Desiderio. Poor Desiderio! They also stole everything they could. Yes, yes, they were from here, from Cantalpino. Unfortunately, this violation was not an isolated incident. In Poveda de las Cintas, a few kilometers from Cantalpino, the story was repeated, this time with the wife of the secretary of the town hall .. “
On August 24, 1936 the blood did not stop in Cantalpino, the impunity of the murders encouraged the Francoists. That same afternoon they appeared in Villoruela, less than 10 kilometers from Cantalpino, 3 Falangists accompanied by fascist neighbors of the town: They arrested the following people: Eustasio Ramos (51 years old), Elías Rivas (43), the brothers Leonardo (43) , and Leoncio Cortés (41), Daniel Sánchez (35), Esteban Hernández (29) Francisco García (25) and Benigno Hidalgo (18).
The fascists gave criminal replies to the families of the detainees when they went to look for them at home: Leonardo Cortés’ wife was asked where her husband was; she replied that she did not know and they answered: “Do not worry, even though he were underground, we will find him”. Daniel Sanchez had been risking his life to save the lives of other people with his mules and his cart to cross the flood, regardless of what color or what party they were. When they went to look for him at home, the woman said to them: “Wait, he is taking off his clothes, he is all wet”; the answer was: “Do not worry, he will get it all the same”. When they went to Esteban Hernández’s house, his mother told them: “wait, he does not have socks”; the answer was: “Do not worry, he will not need them”. When they went to look for Benigno Hidalgo, his mother told them: “I have to give him an injection”; “Do not worry, we’re going to give it to him,” they replied.
Once captured, they were arrested at the City Hall tied hand and foot with ropes. The members of the City Council called a meeting and decided that the 8 detainees should be shot. So bound, they were put on a truck in Villoruela, after midnight, and they were moved to the end of Salvadiós, a town in the province of Ávila. There, at a crossroads, they were shot and left lying in a ditch. Right there they were buried by neighbors from Salvadiós. The murderers were 7 from the town, the one that drove the truck and the 3 outsider Falangists.
Two of the detainees’ wives, María Engracia Cortés and Angeles del Pozo, went to ask for help from the nuns of the convent. They told the nuns what was happening and the nuns answered that this was a crusade, and that if they had not done anything why had they had been fleeing, to which the neighbors correctly answered: “Jesus Christ was also persecuted and though had done nothing, was crucified. “
Jaime Cortés, the son of one of those shot, said that “after the suffering they caused, the fascists appointed among the townspeople a policeman, allegedly civic, to control our movements from home, the demonstrations of suffering. We spent the whole night crying with my mother and my grandparents in the kitchen .. it takes a lot of patience and resignation to live a lifetime with the criminals who shot your father .. We had to go through calamities and sufferings … I always remembered very well a phrase that my mother told us very often: “Children, I never want to see you with blood on your hands” … the only reasons for which they were shot were their way of thinking differently from the Franco regime, that is, to defend freedom, the rights of workers, social security and education … they were shot for defending the largest right of all person: freedom .. “
From the date August 15, 1936 to June 16, 1939, there is no document or record book of the Villoruela archives. Who were the ones who made that documentation disappear? In the book of death certificates for March 13, 1937 the entry inscribed by the judge Iñigo de la Torre these 8 people shot dead are listed as missing.
Originals by Ángel Montoro in Jiminiegos36 and Foro por la memoria (Intervíu nº 177, 4-10 October 1979). Photo by Xavier Miserachs
HOUSING DEMONSTRATIONS MARCH THROUGH DUBLIN
Diarmuid Breatnach
Protesters calling for the urgent construction of public housing marched through Dublin today. Various organisations and many independent activists took part in the protest with a broad range of people took pat, from socialist to republican-orientated, some with their children. The event was organised by the National Homeless and Housing Coalition.
On their Facebook page, the NHHC had issued a statement, part of which read:
“Rebuild Ireland has been an unmitigated disaster yet the cross party motion that was passed in the Dail in October that called for practical actions that would end the emergency, including making it illegal to evict someone into homelessness, were ignored by the government even though it was supported by all parties except Fine Gael. We are demanding action on the motion.
“We also learned that 15 Dublin hotels received over €1m each in 2018 for accommodating homeless families which further illustrates the reliance on the private sector. These families need public housing built on public lands, they need proper homes. Last year there were 842 cases of children being discharged from the Temple Street Emergency Department back into homeless emergency accommodation. The majority of these cases were a direct result of the fact that these children are living in completely unsuitable and cramped emergency accommodation.”
The march, though far from small, seemed somewhat smaller than expected which may have been due to a cold windy day with lashing rain a little earlier in the day but may also have had another cause. The Coalition of groups has split with ICTU (Irish Council of Trade Unions) and a number of NGOs pulling out to form a different campaign on housing, apparently declining to support the demand for public housing on public land.
The organisers of today’s march published a list of demands:
• Declare the housing and homelessness crisis an emergency.
• Provide a minimum of 10,000 public house a year. No to privatization: build public houses on public land.
• Make housing a constitutional right.
• End evictions, bank repossessions and sell-offs to vulture funds.
• Create a national Traveller accommodation agency to oversee and deliver Traveller Accommodation.
• Legislate for real security of tenure, real rent control and affordable rents.
• End the use of B&B’s and hotels for emergency accommodation. Improve emergency accommodation facilities and provide security for all in need.
• Create rent pressure zones for Purpose-Built Student Accommodation (PBSA). Ensure tenant’s rights for students in PBSA and digs-style accommodation.
One group set off from the GPO and after making a circuit on O’Connell Bridge, marched along the north quays, meeting up with another group coming across Butt Bridge to join them from the Housing Agency HQ; apparently another group had marched from City Hall. The march continued on to Samuel Becket Bridge, to the bemusement of some participants, where the participants halted and were addressed by a number of speakers.
Along the route of the march, slogans were shouted, among which were:
“Raise the roof, not the rents!” and “Housing is a human right!”
As well as Socialists, a number of Republicans were in evidence, marching without party banners. Sinn Féin supporters had a banner and party flags, as did People Before Profit and the Workers’ Party. Some Union of Students in Ireland flags were in evidence too. A Travellers’ group and some community groups also carried banners identifying their group with the march and its cause.
Report by Irish Times, with video including interviews with participants: http://https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/thousands-march-in-support-of-homeless-in-dublin-1.3820626?fbclid=IwAR2aW9yLVjHbTrJ9kbb21MEHOl3R8llbRhy3GFeX8NvkGLtdjH69TF9fQxc&mode=amp
End.
“THE LAST COLONY IN AFRICA” — REPRESENTATIVES SPEAK IN DUBLIN
(Approx. reading time: report 10 mins; background 2 mins.)
Report by Diarmuid Breatnach
On Tuesday March 5th a meeting in the Teachers’ Club, Parnell Square, was addressed by representatives of the Western Sahara people and by experts in human rights matters.
(Photo source: Internet)
Western Sahara, a territory of 266,000 square kilometers (103,000 sq. miles) in the Maghreb, was part of Europe’s carve-up of North Africa, when it was known among most states as Spanish Sahara, in acknowledgement of the European state that occupied it. Its people speak Arabic and Castillian (Spanish) and some also speak French, an influence from neighbouring French ex-colonies. Few speak Berber.
The UN General Assembly in 1964 called on Spain to hold a referendum there which the Franco fascist regime declined to do but in 1975, after the dictator’s death, the new regime pulled out of the territory, practically handing it over to Morocco and Mauritania. After a conflict between those two states, Morocco emerged as the sole occupier and the conflict since then has been between the Kingdom of Morocco and the Saharawi people, who seek independence.
Chaired by Mark McLoughlin, filmmaker, the Dublin meeting had been arranged at short notice and its advertising further hampered by cancellation of a booking at Trinity College.
TRACING THE PLUNDER OF SAHARAWI NATURAL RESOURCES
Erik Hagen, of Western Sahara Resource Watch, with a display projected on a screen, showed how his organisation traces the ships arriving at the territory and departing with phosphates mined there to their destinations. From the registered tonnage of the ships, the amount of phosphates plundered can be calculated. The companies involved claim that they are doing no wrong, since they pay Morocco for the cargoes.
But according to the UN, no state may extract resources from a disputed territory without the consent of the people. Hagen talked about how EU had changed the wording to replace “consent of” with “being of benefit to” and then went on to effectively falsify agreement on ‘benefit‘, using a document on consultation with huge majority – and a total of Saharawi organisations – voting against as evidence for.
The only company currently exploring for oil in Western Sahara is San Leon, an Irish company, although they failed to find any and are currently fighting in financial difficulties.
Clive Symmonds, expert in international law talked about the policy of isolating produce from occupied territories, by first compelling their labeling as such, which, although that would not ban the products, would facilitate a ban if such were decided. The Control of Economic Activity (Occupied Territories) Bill 2018 introduced to the Oireachtas (Irish legislature) and currently being processed with cross-house support despite Government opposition, is an example of how such a ban may be implemented (and Senator Black’s Bill will also be valid for Western Sahara). Of course, as Symmonds pointed out, such labeling is left to the exporter which in this case would be the Kingdom of Morocco.
Symmonds also referred to the EU Fisheries Agreement which, in permitting fishing within what Morocco claims as its territorial waters without reference to the Saharawi people, is permitting the plunder of the Saharawi people’s fish stocks – and the Irish State is a party to this, having signed the Agreement. Symmonds pointed out that the judgement of the European Court of Justice on 21st December 2016, stated that Western Sahara is a “separate and distinct” territory from Morocco and that trade agreements between the EU and Morocco do not apply to the occupied territory. The EU is in violation of this judgement.
“A REFERENDUM IS THE ONLY DEMOCRATIC WAY”
Mohamed Belsat, Frente Polisario Ambassador to Europe, talked about the policies of the Irish state, the EU and, in particular, France. Belsat said that they were in collusion with the Kingdom of Morocco and that in particular, France often seemed to be the opponent of the Saharawi people even more than Morocco.
Referring to what he said was the only democratic of ascertaining the will of the Saharawi people, Belsat said that it was a referendum. Morocco had called for this since they had flooded Western Sahara with Moroccans but, since the process of registration of genuine and historical residents of the area had been completed by the UN, the Moroccan Kingdom had withdrawn all support for a referendum.
“The cost of the occupation to the Moroccan kingdom is huge, in terms of military presence maintenance and so on,” Belsat said, adding that the cost of every litre of water supplied to the occupation forces was equal to four times the price of a litre of whiskey. Furthermore, the cost to the Kingdom exceeded the benefits it extracted from the colony. In January, Morocco had at last joined and signed up to the constitution of the African Union, the organisation of African states, of which Western Sahara is a founding member and which has a long-standing position on Western Sahara being an occupied colonyFor all these and other reasons, including dissatisfaction with the regime among the Moroccan general population, he felt that a campaign of pressure on Morocco and on the EU might well bear fruit in terms of the decolonisation of this “last colony in Africa”.
Later, Belsat’s response to a question from the audience amounted to an admission that there was no “peace process.” (sic) in operation (despite a reference to it by a number of speakers) and that as a result of this and the conditions under which they were kept by their oppressors, it was increasingly difficult to restrain the youth from resorting to armed resistance. At this a member of the audience commented that armed struggle against the army of the Moroccan Kingdom backed up by France would be “suicidal”.
“57 POLITICAL PRISONERS BUT MANY MORE HAVE DISAPPEARED WITHOUT TRACE”
ElGhalia Djimi, Vice-President of ASDH (Saharawi Association of Victims of grave violations of human rights by the Moroccan State), which cooperates with the League for the Protection of Western Sahara Political Prisoners in Moroccan Jails (LPPS), who had arrived in Ireland that day, made her presentation next. Speaking in French through a translator, Djimi talked about the conditions of life under occupation for the Saharawi people. Djimi showed a compilation of clips of soldiers, police and people in civilian clothes physically assaulting protesting Saharawi women, pulling their hair, punching and kicking them and informed the meeting that those in plainclothes were Moroccan police.
“There are 57 Saharawi political prisoners in Moroccan jails,” ElGhalia Djimi said, “but many more that have disappeared without trace.”
Unemployment is high among the Western Sahara people and as a result of that and other deficiencies in their lives, a drug problem has arisen, she told her audience. There are no third-level education facilities in the territory, obliging them to go to institutions in Morocco. Although they can study to gain professional qualifications for civil employment, those available are not usually those required by the employers, which is not true for their equivalent in Morocco, with the result that often Moroccans fit into the administrative jobs better than do the Saharawi people. In terms of their treatment by the authorities, all Sahawaris carry a Moroccan ID card but letters on it indicate their ethnic origin (which Belsat likened to the Nazi State’s requirement that German Jews by identifiable in their national ID documentation).
Moroccan citizen settlement in Layoune, the capital of Western Sahara, had now placed the indigenous people, once the majority, in a minority.
(Photo: D.Breatnach)
SOLIDARITY IN DUBLIN
In conclusion of the speakers’ presentations, Mohamed Belsat asked for support from the Irish people with their “history of struggle for freedom and solidarity with other struggling nations”‘
A couple of members of the audience mentioned that there had been an active solidarity committee with Western Sahara in Dublin in the past and one wondered about the possibility of resuscitating it.
Comment: The solidarity Committee in Dublin was independent of any political party or organisation, its name was Western Sahara Action Ireland and its FB page is still in existence. Between 2011 and 2012, the group organised a number of public events, including: two protests about Moroccan repression of Saharawi protesters, one in Dame Street and another in O’Connell Street; a protest against the EU’s Fisheries Agreement outside the Dublin offices of the EU in Dawson Street; the construction and maintenance of a “Western Sahara Tent” at the Electric Picnic of 2012, along with an exhibition of photographs taken in the territory. The latter was visited by Michael O’Higgins who was then campaigning for the Presidency of Ireland (he also appeared in the film shown at the beginning of public meeting in Dublin).
On each of the Dublin street events, a small group of Moroccans had attended to harass and attempt to intimidate the protesters, almost certainly sent by the Moroccan Embassy but their efforts were to no avail.
(Photo source: Western Sahara Action Ireland)
BACKGROUND
There had been many uprisings against colonial rule in the history of Western Sahara and the last Rif War, from 1920 to 1927, had cost the Spanish State military 23,000 casualties, of which 18,000 were fatalities. Only for the intervention of the French1, the forces led by Abd el Krim would have kicked the Spanish colonialists out of the footholds to which they were still clinging.2
Like the French in their North African colonies, the Spanish occupiers had suppressed risings not only by military force against insurgents and torture of captives, including electric shocks, but also by terror against the civilian population, including assassinations, massacres, rape and internment without trial.
Both European states also developed their own Foreign Legions. Forget about the 1924 Beau Geste novel by PC Wren and the various screenplays3 to which it gave rise; the Foreign Legions were tough terrorists in uniform, founded not to fight in open war but against resisting colonial peoples.
Since 1963, Western Sahara has been on the United Nations’ list of “non self-governing nations”. In 1965, the UN General Assembly, in its first declaration on Western Sahara, called on the Spanish State to decolonise the territory and, in 1967, to hold a referendum on self-determination but Spain refused. From 1973 to 1975, the Frente Polisario fought an armed struggle for national liberation.
After the Spanish State abruptly pulled out in 1975 (following the death of its fascist dictator General Franco) and – without allowing elections of an independent Saharawi government before doing so – it relinquished control to the Kingdom of Morocco (which had formally claimed the territory since 1957) and Mauritania and conflict broke out between those states. Mauritania in time abandoned its claim and Morocco moved in and seized Western Sahara.
The Saharawi people protested Morocco’s occupation of their land and were suppressed by military and police. The Frente Polisario fought the occupying Moroccan military from 1975 until a UN-brokered ceasefire in 1991, since which there has been no Saharawi armed struggle but plenty of Moroccan repression. One of the features of the struggle was the displacement of a large part of the Saharawi population as people fled the Moroccan military, many to Algeria (which had won independence from France in 1962 after a fierce and dirty war), where they remain in a refugee camp. The Moroccan Kingdom then built a wall to prevent Saharawis from returning, which it guards by troops and miles of landmines.
End.
FOOTNOTES
1The casualties of the French, according to Wikipedia, amounted to 10,000 with 2,500 killed in battle. The casualties of the insurgents and of the indigenous civilian population, as usual in these situations, is difficult to determine but, according to Wikipedia, came to 30,000, of which 10,000 were fatalities.
2For more on the Rif War 1920, read the article about it (see link in Resources and Useful Links).
3Including those of 1939 starring Gary Cooper and Ray Miland, 1966 with Telly Savalas and Doug McClure and the BBC serial of 1982.
REFERENCES AND USEFUL LINKS
Sahara Press Service: https://www.spsrasd.info/news/en
Western Sahara Resources Watch: https://www.wsrw.org/
Western Sahara Action Ireland facebook page (please bear in mind that at the time of writing this group is not active): https://www.facebook.com/groups/256377861125569/
Article on the Rif War 1920 by me: https://rebelbreeze.wordpress.com/2018/08/09/an-old-war-with-a-lesson-for-today/
Recent Amnesty International report on Western Sahara under Moroccan rule: https://www.refworld.org/docid/5a9938ac4.html
DUBLIN PICKET AGAINST INTERNMENT COMMEMORATES HUNGER STRIKERS
With thanks from Dublin Anti-Internment Committee’s FB page End Internment
DUBLIN PICKET PROTESTS CONTINUING INTERNMENT IN IRELAND WHILE EXPRESSING INTERNATIONALIST SOLIDARITY WITH PALESTINIAN PRISONERS.
PALESTINIAN Y0UNG WOMAN PRESENTS PICKETERS WITH BUQUET OF FLOWERS.
HUNGER STRIKER MARTYRS OF 1981 REMEMBERED.
On a cold and wet late Saturday afternoon (2/03/2019) in Dublin city’s main thoroughfare, O’Connel Street, hurrying shoppers and tourists were treated to the sight of protesters outside the General Post Office. One group was flying small flags of a green, white and orange tricolour but not the Irish one – the colour bands were horizontal.
The other group flew a larger tricolour, the Irish national flag, the colours horizontal – and also a Palestinian flag. One of their banners was an enlargement of the cartoon by Brazilian graphic artist Carlos Latuff , showing an Irish hand reaching through prison bars to clasp that of a Palestinian, also emerging through bars.
The first group was of Indians in a protest related to the current tensions between the states of Pakistan and India, while the other had been organised by the Dublin Anti-Internment Committee and was supported by other Republicans and unaligned socialists. The presence of both outside the GPO was a coincidence and they were separated by a little distance.
INTERNMENT WITHOUT TRIAL CONTINUES IN IRELAND
One of the monthly pickets of the DAI Committee to raise awareness of the ongoing internment in Ireland, the picketers combined their action with expressing solidarity with Palestinian political prisoners of which many are held without charge, in “administrative detention”.
(photo: Dublin Anti-Internment Committee)
In Ireland, there are other kinds of “administrative detention” but they are not called that; instead they go under the names of “revoking of licence” and “refusal of bail”.
The first category relates only to the occupied Six Counties, where those political prisoners were released under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement; however their licence may be revoked at any time in which case the unfortunate person will be brought straight to jail without trial and held there indefinitely. This has been the fate of a number of former prisoners who remain Republican activists. One of those, Tony Taylor, was released without charge at the end of November last year, having spent nearly a thousand days in custody.
The second category and by far the most common, both in the British colony and the Irish state, is that of refusing bail to Irish Republicans while they await trial on as yet unproven charges. In these circumstances the accused, if judged “not guilty” at their trial, may have spent more than two years in prison by that time. A recent example of refusal of bail was that of Republican activist Alan Lundy arrested for alleged armed burglary on 18th February, despite an alibi apparently confirmed by CCTV footage placing him 40 miles away at the time and highly contradictory evidence from the alleged victims.
The intention of these totally undemocratic measures is an attack on the basic civil rights of Republicans to peacefully organise and to assemble in protest. When bail is granted, the intention is made clear since regularly the conditions attached are that the accused wear an electronic tag, may not participate in political meetings or demonstrations and must observe a curfew. Furthermore, the accused are brought before the no-jury Special Courts of both administrations, where special rules of “evidence” apply.
The Dublin Anti-Internment Committee maintains that these measures amount to internment without trial, a continuation of the policy in which courts are used, as Brigadier Kitson of the British Army proudly declared, as “a propaganda cover for the removal of unwanted members of the public”.
The Dublin Committee has also repeatedly pointed out that these measures are a danger to the civil rights of any and all movements of opposition to the State or its policies and should therefore be opposed by all democratic people, whatever their particular political alignment might be.
FLOWERS PRESENTED FOR SOLIDARITY
The picketers distributed leaflets to passers-by, some of which took photographs. Two young women who had taken photographs returned a second time, one of them presenting a bouquet of flowers to the surprised protesters. She said that she was doing so in gratitude for she was of Palestinian backround.
(photo: Dublin Anti-Internment Committee)
There are approaching 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails, of which around 170 are held without trial, in “administrative detention”.
REMEMBERING THE HUNGER STRIKES
At a certain point during the event, the picketers took up black flags and displayed them until the end of the event in remembrance of the ten dead hunger-strikers of 1981 (seven Provisional IRA and three INLA). March 1st was the anniversary of the first day of the hunger strikes of that year fighting British attempts to paint them as criminals, when Bobby Sands embarked on his 66 days of hunger, the first of ten Republican political prisoners to give their lives. Bobby Sands, revolutionary and poet, died on May 5th and over 100,000 people lined the route of his funeral in Belfast, protests took place throughout much of the world and official marks of respect were given, including a statement of solidarity by Palestinian prisoners of the Israeli State. During his hunger strike Bobby Sands had been elected an MP to the British Parliament and two more, Kieran Doherty and Paddy Agnew, were elected members of the Dáil (Irish Parliament) in Cavan-Monaghan, while Joe McDonnell was narrowly defeated in the Sligo-Leitrim constituency.
These events had long term effects even in electoral politics. The British changed electoral law to prevent prisoners ever being elected again (Representation of the People Act 1981), Sinn Féin became a predominantly constitutional party and every Irish Government since 1981 has been a coalition of some kind.
A chríoch.
(photo: Dublin Anti-Internment Committee)
Short video clip here:https://www.facebook.com/581232915354743/videos/319325982052745/
rebelbreeze 