Kevin O'Keeffe (Cork East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for facilitating this debate. I am not looking for a change in foreign policy but for more emphasis to be put on this issue, which my colleagues Deputies Mattie McGrath and Noel Grealish join with me in raising today.

Ireland was once known as the land of saints and scholars. This arose from our conversion to Christianity centuries ago. Europe has come a long way with its multicultural society but there are still major Christian values in place. The Middle East - including Syria - was the birthplace of Christianity and when its population came under attack centuries ago, we had the Crusades, which involved multinational armies drawn from countries across Europe such as Britain and Ireland. Those involved played no small part in ensuring that Christians could live where they were born, as was the case with their ancestors.

There have been many attempts at systematic extermination since then. It is ironic that, under previous dictatorship regimes in the Middle East, Christians were afforded some reasonable protection and lived in harmony with the Muslims and the other minority religious groups. Deputies Mattie McGrath, Durkan and I attended a conference at which we were well briefed on what is happening in the Middle East. We met some of the authorities from the Christian communities and the stories they told us of what is happening in there would make the hairs stand up on the back of the neck. What has happened is shameful.

It is six years since the crisis erupted in Syria, but it took the washing up of the body of a little boy on the shoreline of a European country to bring home what is going on in the Middle East. Ireland and the EU opened their borders for the influx of refugees. I commend the Ministers and their Departments on making available the ships of the Naval Service and I commend the crews of those vessels on the good work they have done to provide protection for people who are trying to escape from these hostile communities. We should, however, be doing more on the ground in the Middle East to ensure that the Christians to whom I refer are protected in order that they can survive in their own homelands, which constitute the birthplace of Christianity. I ask that the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputy Flanagan give serious thought to this matter.

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