Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 1 July 2015

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade

Amnesty International Annual Report 2014

10:00 am

Photo of Dan NevilleDan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Amnesty International to the committee. Several issues are going under the radar due to increased difficulties around the world. One of these is the treatment of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, LGBT, community, particularly in some Third World and even First World countries. Uganda, for example, has the death penalty for LGBT activists and even for those in LGBT relationships. Very little change has occurred in this. If anything, there has been some deterioration and discrimination.

The committee has heard from representatives of Christian communities whose members have been murdered in parts of the world where they are a minority. There seems to be very little international outrage about the persecution of minorities, including Christian communities, especially in places like Afghanistan and by ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

The death penalty is a serious issue in the United States. Does it not constitute torture to keep somebody on death row for 30 years or, as Deputy Quinn said, in solitary confinement for 40 years? Are we reluctant to identify it as this because everybody in the West is anxious to be friends with the United States? The death penalty is outrageous in itself, not to mention having someone in solitary confinement for 40 years. While we abhor this, do we strongly condemn having somebody waiting to be taken out of his or her cell to be executed?

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.