Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

There problem is that there is a creeping involvement of Irish Defence Forces operations in more NATO-led missions or under the guise of the EU rather than traditional UN peacekeeping measures and I wonder what the breakdown is in terms of costs. Is there a departure with the Syrian mission in terms of the amount of moneys being refunded to the State? Is it the position in this case that all of the money traditionally is refunded by the United Nations? I note that last year there was an allocation of more than €10 million in regard to the participation of Irish Defence Forces personnel in the EU battle groups. Was that money spent or where is that reflected in this information? While people feel proud about the role that our troops would play in peacekeeping missions there is a very fine line and there has been an elimination of our neutrality and more involvement with NATO forces.

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