Ms Niamh Ní Bhriain:

EU missions have been rolled out since 2003. Once the Nice treaty was enacted, the EU started deploying military missions across Africa. They started in the Balkans and there have also been deployments in Somalia in the Red Sea area. These have been hugely problematic. The Mali example is not an isolated case. Niger is another example where a mission was approved. The EU started sending in financial support to buy serious contingents of lethal military equipment. That started in February 2023 and by the summer of 2023, there was a coup using the very same funding that the EU had sent and the lethal equipment that had been purchased by the EU for Niger. Mali is an example where the EU is training soldiers. Two coups took place while the EU troops were there. Mozambique is another example where EU training missions are taking place and then there are horrific human rights violations. I set some of them out in the submission. There is ample evidence that the EU missions have nothing to do with peace. They do not bring peace. One can see a track record of where the missions go in and there is more and more instability instead of less. Mali is a case in point but there are various examples.

Regarding the pressure point and deployment, an EU battle group has never been deployed. They train constantly and the most recent training exercise was in Hungary in March and April 2025 when 139 Irish troops took part in that training exercise. It says in EU documents that they will deploy within five days. That is the idea. In those five days, without a triple lock and with the pressure coming from Brussels, that is the pressure the Government is going to be under to send Irish people. It is said very clearly that these are combat conflict missions to be deployed outside the EU under an EU mandate. That is the pressure the Government is going to be under and it will have five days to decide whether to send Irish troops. This is clearly not enough. We need a safeguard. This is Ireland becoming embroiled in a foreign war on behalf of the EU in an instance that has nothing to do with us.

As regards NATO, Ireland has had a Partnership for Peace agreement with NATO since 1999. NATO is a war alliance. Partnership for Peace is a stepping stone into being part of NATO. I do not think the Government has any intention of becoming a full member but we do not need to be a full member. We are already so closely aligned with NATO and the EU. In the words of Ursula von der Leyen, the EU is "one Union, one Alliance, united in purpose". That is a quotation from Ursula von der Leyen as regards the EU and NATO and that relationship. Often it is said we are not going to become a member of NATO. We do not need to be a member. We are already so closely aligned that if this legislation is enacted, we can be sent without any safeguard at all on any NATO mission. We have seen NATO participate in invasions in Libya, in the Balkans early on, in Serbia, in Afghanistan and in Iraq. We are opening ourselves up to having Irish troops sent on those missions if we approve this legislation.