Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The international community must respond to an issue such as this one in Libya and it must be through the United Nations. This is why this was done by way of a United Nations Security Council resolution, which we support. It needs to be backed up by political and diplomatic work, which is why Ireland supports the work of the special envoy to explore what progress can be made in getting a complete ceasefire, bringing an end to the violence and the conflict, and bringing about the kind of political change for which the citizens of Libya have been calling in much the same way as has happened in the other countries that have been part of the Arab spring - except in this case they were crushed.

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