March To Get The US Murder Machine Out Of Shannon
Concerned citizens from across the country will be travelling to Dublin this Saturday (November 10) to call on the Twenty-Six County government to immediately cease their collaboration with the imperialist forces occupying Iraq.
More than one million US troops have now passed through Shannon Airport on their way to the war-zone created by Messrs Bush and Blair in 2003.
Fianna Fáil, the Progressive Democrats and, more recently, the Green Party have been shameless in their debasement of the alleged neutrality of the Twenty-Six County state through this blatant assistance of the US government.
The CIA has also regularly used Shannon to refuel unmarked planes, quite possibly while they were in the process of transporting prisoners for the purpose of torture.
There are no official figures for the number of indigenous fatalities in Iraq since the US-British led invasion. However, there is little doubt that the figure runs into the hundreds of thousands at a minimum. In addition, four million people are estimated to have been displaced as a result of the occupation.
As the US military and political machine gears up for an attack on Iran, anti-war activists from Belfast, Cork, Derry, Galway, Mullingar, Tralee and Waterford will join their Dublin based comrades in an effort to end Irish complicity in what amounts to an act of legalised mass murder.
Michael Youlton, co-chair of the Irish Anti-War Movement, said the situation in Iraq is now very serious.
“Iraqi society has been seriously damaged, with its economy, infrastructure and cultural structures in tatters. Over one million US troops have passed through Shannon Airport to and from this mayhem – an illegal war...Why is our government involving us further and deeper in this brutal adventure?”
Éirígí spokesperson Daithí Mac An Mháistír called on people to join the march to show their disgust at this aspect of Dublin government policy.
“It is essential that the Irish people place pressure on the powers that be in Leinster House if we are to retain any decency in the eyes of the civilised world.
“The one million uniformed troops who have passed through Shannon since 2003 aren’t peacekeepers or development workers – they are trained killers. They are trained killers who are using their deadly weaponry in an illegal war, carried out in the interests of the rich and powerful in their own and other countries.
Daithí continued: “The Iraqi people never requested the presence of foreign soldiers on their soil and, since the invasion, they have refused to give their consent to the continued presence of these soldiers.
“Given this fact, the use of Shannon Airport by human-rights abusers and murderers should be ended immediately. Until then, the notion that the Twenty-Six County state is in anyway neutral is nothing short of laughable.”
Saturday’s march will assemble at the Central Bank in Dame Street, Dublin at 2pm before making its way to the GPO. Bígí linn.