Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Tairgim: "Go léifear an Bille an Dara hUair anois."

I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

I wish to begin by thanking Dr. Ed Horgan and Mr. John Lannon of Shannonwatch, who have been involved in a long-running campaign to have neutrality enshrined in the Constitution and to have Ireland promote peace rather than facilitate a war effort. The amount of time they have put into that campaign beggars belief. Both men have been doing something very positive for this country for a long period.

Since 1939, successive governments have continually declared that Ireland is a neutral state, subject to the rules and obligations applicable to such states under international law. In recent years the current Government has attempted to redefine neutrality in order to justify its entanglement in military alliances such as the NATO Partnership for Peace, PfP, and European Union battle groups under the Common Foreign and Security Policy, CFSP. However, the rules are clearly defined in Article 2 to The Hague Convention, which states that "Belligerents are forbidden to move troops or convoys of either munitions of war or supplies across the territory of a neutral Power." Since October 2001, successive governments have allowed over 2.5 million armed US-NATO troops and large quantities of war materials to pass through Shannon airport on their way to and from the Afghan and Iraq wars, in clear contravention of the customary international laws on neutrality.

Earlier this month, the Minister for Defence, Deputy Coveney, stated, "While Ireland is committed to a policy of military neutrality, we need to be clear that Ireland is not ideologically neutral. Political neutrality in international affairs has never been part of Ireland's foreign policy tradition". This statement came directly after the Minister reaffirmed the Government's commitment to Article 29.1 of the Constitution, which states, "Ireland affirms its devotion to the ideal of peace and friendly co-operation amongst nations founded on international justice and morality." It is crystal clear that Article 29.1 of the Constitution states that Ireland is devoted to the ideal of peace, friendly co-operation, international justice and morality. It is also crystal clear that these are ideological and political concepts in and of themselves. The Minister holds that we are committed to the political concept of neutrality in one breath, while in the next he states that we are not, and never have been, "ideologically or politically neutral". There is only one type of neutrality covered by international laws on neutrality and that is military neutrality. The concepts of political and ideological neutrality simply do not apply.

The concept of ideological neutrality, while nonsensical, is a new phenomenon. It has only been referred to in the Dáil on three occasions in the context of the concept of neutrality as regards international warfare. It was first mentioned in passing by former Minister and Deputy, Pat Carey, in 2004 and then once by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Charles Flanagan, last year and again by the Minister for Defence, Deputy Coveney, this month. Never has this new concept been defined, yet the aforementioned Ministers, in their clamour to legitimise and justify our taking sides in international acts of aggression, both state that Ireland is not, and never has been, politically or ideologically neutral.

There is no concrete and clear commitment to neutrality in the Constitution. For far too long, this Government and others which preceded it have used this lack of clarity to lie to the Irish people and this House about where we stand. The Ministers for Defence and Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputies Coveney and Flanagan, have even gone so far as to invent an entirely new category of neutrality that has no place, meaning or purchase, anywhere in international law. This behaviour is entirely consistent with the lie that made Ireland a belligerent in the Iraq war in 2003, while still claiming the status of a neutral country. In March 2003, Bertie Ahern, the then Head of Government, lied to this House and the Irish people, when he argued that facilitating the use of Shannon for the then illegal invasion of Iraq was "not of sufficient degree or substance to constitute participating in the war". He also said that "The provision of facilities does not make Ireland a member of a military coalition". These statements, and many more that were made on 20 March 2003, were outright lies. On reading the transcript of the argument put forward by the then Taoiseach, one would not know whether to laugh or cry. It is a heady mixture of false prophecies-----

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