Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

The so-called consultative forums are already up with a predetermined outcome to undermine neutrality further. If that was not already clear from the fact that the Government has Bertholt Brecht-style dissolved the random selection of citizens and replaced them with a so-called expert group, it should be absolutely crystal clear when we look at who the Government has appointed as the chairperson – Dame Louise Richardson, dame of the British Empire – someone who in writing repeatedly identifies with the aims and targets of US militarism. Writing after the US invasion of Afghanistan following 9-11, she writes: "We did not use the mechanism of NATO or any other international institution to fashion or implement a response. We felt strong enough to react on our own, and so we did." Writing about the attempted and implemented coups in Chile, Cuba and Nicaragua, she says: "An examination of these cases reveals that the United States had very good reasons to object to the governments of Chile, Cuba, and Nicaragua. Their ideological orientation was inimical to its own, so it supported local groups that used whatever means were available to them to try to bring them down.“ This is absolutely transparent.

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