Ahern wildly off the mark on renditions report
– Dáil must now investigate Ireland’s role in torture flights;
Shannon effectively now a US military airport
Green Party Chairman and Foreign Affairs spokesperson John Gormley TD welcomed the European Parliament’s adoption today of a report that strongly condemns the Irish Government for failing to inspect planes used in the illegal detention and transportation of terror suspects. Deputy Gormley said the Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern was wildly off the mark in attempting to counter attack the accusations of Ireland’s complicity with the CIA in human rights abuses.
“The European Parliament’s adoption of the renditions report makes the holding of a Dáil inquiry on the issue imperative,” said Deputy Gormley. “The report confirms that planes involved in renditions used Shannon airport to refuel. This undoubtedly constitutes complicity in human rights abuses and is therefore a breach of international law.
“There is no way Dermot Ahern is going to spin his way out of this. The Government’s reliance on diplomatic assurances from the US instead of active inspections is a farce. I hope the Taoiseach has learned a lesson that looking ‘the great’ George Bush in the eye and asking ‘to be sure, to be sure’ does not match up to his obligations to protect human rights and the neutrality of the country.
“The Government would clearly prefer if a Dáil inquiry did not take place, especially in the run-up to a general election. Such an inquiry would likely reveal that Irish neutrality is a sham, that the Government deliberately turned a blind eye to human rights abuses, and that Shannon airport is now, for all intents and purposes, a US military airport,” concluded Deputy Gormley.