Tag Archives: US military

TDs Clare Daly and Mick Wallace are due to appear before Ennis District Court on Tuesday morning in relation to an alleged “illegal entrance” to a restricted area of Shannon Airport last July. Shannonwatch has issued a call for people to to come to the court to support the TDs , “who attempted to inspect a US military plane at Shannon”. “Their alleged offence is illegal entrance into a restricted area of the airport, and their action was in response to the failure of the authorities to inspect US aircraft at Shannon,” said a Shannonwatch spokesman. Shannonwatch have repeatedly called for an end to the US military use of Shannon. They also call for inspection of all military and suspected CIA aircraft at the airport for as long as they are being allowed to pass through. “Clare Daly and Mick Wallace have made it clear that as legislators and as citizens they have a responsibility to uphold Irish neutrality. They …

The Oireachtas Joint Committee on Public Service Oversight and Petitions will meet on Wednesday  (tomorrow) with senior diplomats to consider a petition calling for an investigation into the US military and CIA use of Shannon Airport and Irish airspace. Niall Burgess, secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, will address the committee on Ireland’s longstanding policy of military neutrality. Dr Edward Horgan, Margaretta D’Arcy and Dr John Lannon, of the Shannonwatch organisation, addressed the committee on their petition in June, and a delegation from the committee visited Shannon in October to hear a range of perspectives on the issue. Chairman of the committee, Padraig Mac Lochlainn, said, “This petition is a request to the Oireachtas Petitions Committee to examine the legislative and legal international peace and accountability implications that arise from the authorisation by successive Irish governments from 2001 to date, of the use of Shannon airport and Irish airspace for the transit of United States armed …

Eighty-year-old peace activist, Margaretta D’Arcy  was brought to Limerick Prison on Wednesday  after she presented herself at a garda station in Galway. On June 24, Ms D’Arcy of 10 St Brigid’s Place, Woodquay, Galway and Niall Farrell, a 60-year-old man with an address at Ballynacloghy, Maree, Galway were both found guilty of interfering with the proper use of Shannon Airport on September 1, 2013, at a sitting of Ennis District Court. The defendants were sentenced to two weeks in prison, which was suspended on condition that they enter a bond to stay away from restricted areas of Shannon Airport, something Ms D’Arcy refused to do. Speaking on Wednesday, Ms D’Arcy’s son Finn Arden said, “She brought herself to the garda station in Galway at 11am this morning and then she was carted off in a garda car to Limerick.” Speaking about his mother’s frame of mind on Wednesday, he said, “Gardaí came to the house earlier and they wanted to …