Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I, too, am concerned about recent events in Europe. During the lifetime of this Dáil, we have argued with our Government that it would be good to put a lot more effort into working for peace and taking a neutral position, rather than taking sides in wars and facilitating the American war machine.

Some years ago, Europe had a more neutral position in terms of what was happening internationally than it has at present. I find its approach to many things now is worrying. Europe's failure to address the Palestinian issue has been evident for a long time. The manner in which we have dealt with Saudi Arabia is also worrying. This month, 47 people were executed in Saudi Arabia, 43 of whom were beheaded. I do not remember hearing any protest by our Government or other western governments about that but maybe I missed it. What Saudi Arabia is doing is similar to what ISIS does. God knows, people are right to condemn the barbaric nature of ISIS but I wish they would also condemn the barbaric nature of Saudi Arabia in much of what it does.

The current war in Yemen is really worrying and what is occurring there is absolutely terrible. Every human rights body on the planet has condemned what Saudi Arabia and the US-Britain supported coalition is doing there. The Minister of State probably does not remember but a few weeks after Obama was awarded the Nobel peace prize, he ordered a cruise missile strike in Yemen complete with cluster bombs.

It ended the lives of 35 women and children, none of whose humanity was acknowledged in virtually any western media reports.

Last year the marketplace in Fayoush in Yemen experienced a massive airstrike that killed at least 45 civilians, wounding another 50. We can be sure that none of the victims was profiled in western media. Their names were not mentioned. No television network interviewed their grieving families. We never learnt about their extinguished life aspirations or the children turned into orphans. There was no Twitter hashtag in memory or support of them. This was an horrific bombing and there have been many others. Given that the war started only last March, to date just under 3,000 civilians have been killed by airstrikes supported by the US, Britain and Saudi Arabia - the so-called coalition, along with support from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

I do not understand why we do not have a position on this. Are we okay with it? The statistics coming out of Yemen are striking. Along with the Saudi coalition’s bombing campaign, American warships have also helped to enforce a naval blockade. According to the UN, this collective punishment has left the country on the brink of famine, with desperate shortages of food, medical supplies and fuel which is used for pumping increasingly scarce water from the depths of the country’s depleted water tables. To the best of my memory it has a population of approximately 27 million people. Four out of five Yemenis are now in need of humanitarian assistance and we have very little to say about it. Europe has very little to say about it because Saudi Arabia is a friend of the US.

What kind of credibility do we have if we will not call a spade a spade? We are right to condemn the atrocities of ISIS, but why are we not condemning the atrocities of Saudi Arabia? Last year the Saudis bought 22,000 bombs from the Americans at a cost of $1.2 billion. They are cluster bombs in nature. This afternoon I watched a scary video showing how they work. People should look at it because the way they spread and target multiple areas is barbaric. One dropped from an aeroplane can hit ten or 12 buildings at a time. It is horrific. The Minister of State should watch it to bring home the barbarity of it all.

In 2014, the Taoiseach and the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation visited Saudi Arabia. After the meeting the Taoiseach said, "I congratulated Saudi on their leadership in terms of moderation here in the Gulf region and their desire for a peaceful situation on a lot of very complex and technical issues." The Taoiseach also said that he raised the issue of human rights by offering his congratulations to the prince on being invited to the Human Rights Council of the United Nations. My God, we are congratulating these people.

I think people are starting to accept that the Turks represent a serious problem in the region given how they have been massacring the Kurds. They have actually helped ISIS to develop. ISIS uses the Turkish border like a sieve and Turkey is okay with it because its main concern is the Kurds and it is using this situation to obliterate as many Kurds as it can.

When will people wake up to the fact that the Saudis are every bit as big a problem if not a bigger problem? Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar have helped fund ISIS and other extreme fundamentalist terrorist activities for a long period. It is unbelievable that everyone is okay with that. Some 16 of the 19 involved in the 11 September 2001 attacks on New York were from Saudi Arabia, but the Americans went and bombed Afghanistan and are still bombing it.

We talk about atrocities. How many people has ISIS killed since 2006? Has it killed 10,000 or 100,000? I do not know. It is not more than 100,000 for sure. Figures now show that the US military machine and the US and western forces have killed in the region of 2.1 million civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq alone since 2001. Where is the terror coming from? Who is causing the most terror? Who is killing the most people? Why can we not call the truth? What is wrong with that anymore? It is just horrific.

The arms industry has never been in such a healthy state. It is running out of cluster bombs and cruise missiles. Shares in arms companies are increasing rapidly because so many arms are being used. It is interesting that in President Obama's two election campaigns, the arms industry gave him more money than it gave his Republican opponents. His four biggest contributors were the arms, pharmaceutical, oil and coal industries. One gets nothing for nothing in this world and payback always comes. If the US were not dropping bombs on people's homes and villages, the arms industry would not be doing very well. It would not be making as many bombs, fighter planes and God knows what. I wish to God Ireland would just call it as it is and tell the truth. It is just too bad.

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