Réada Cronin (Kildare North, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

As peacekeepers, members of the Defence Forces represent us at our very best across the world. They are currently in action helping to extract our citizens caught up in the conflict in Sudan. I have every confidence in the courage and expertise of the Defence Forces and the Army Ranger Wing to get our people home. They are all in our thoughts.

I take this opportunity to thank our European neighbours for their assistance thus far. I commend the Department on its quick response, given what transpired in the past week, in coming to the aid of our citizens in Sudan. I also express solidarity with the people of Sudan. I hope that the ceasefire holds and that there can be some negotiation towards lasting peace.

On Operation Irini, Sinn Féin will be supporting this UN-backed mission conditionally in line with the assurances given by the Government. Its primary mandate is to implement the arms embargo on Libya. That is admirable, because the last thing a volatile Libya needs now is more illegally imported weapons. It would be akin to pouring petrol on a raging fire. However, I have some concerns around the secondary mandates of the operation.

I am pleased to note that the Naval Service will not be engaging with the dubious organisation euphemistically called "the Libyan Coast Guard" as part of its mission. This organisation is already the subject of major concerns regarding alleged breaches of international law and human rights abuses. These allegations have been made by multiple NGOs and aid organisations and by the EU and its military mission in a leaked report from last year.

There are appalling conditions in the Libyan camps where Médecins Sans Frontières, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have all pointed to torture, rape, shootings and human rights abuses of the most awful kind. It is a travesty of justice that the EU considers Libyan ports as ports of safe return when all the evidence shows that they are anything but. I am reassured that desperate people who may be picked up by our sailors will be transferred to a European vessel and not handed over to that coastguard.

Operation Irini, unlike Operation Sophia a few years ago, involves no mandate for search and rescue. As is well known, maritime law dictates that if any vessel notes another vessel in distress it is duty bound to go to its immediate rescue. There is no conflict of interest in that instance and I am satisfied that we all know this. However, we all know the dangers of unseaworthy vessels that human traffickers use in the Mediterranean to transport desperate people looking for a better life. I seek clarity from the Tánaiste that in the context of Operation Irini, due to the lack of a specific safety of life at sea search and rescue mandate, the honourable people in the Naval Service will not be faced with an impossible dilemma. If, in pursuit of a suspected vehicle, they notice one of these refugee-carrying death traps referred to as a boat, which may be unable to send distress signals, will they abandon the primary objective of interdicting the target vessel in order to render potential lifesaving assistance or will they continue on the original pursuit? Many of those people who are in these boats have never seen the sea previously, never mind been in a boat, and they may not even know how to send a distress signal.

The Government was rightly proud of our holding a seat in the UN Security Council - a position secured with the support of small nations that admire Ireland's neutral position as an honest broker in international affairs. As a neutral country that the vast majority of people want to remain neutral - as has been shown in numerous polls - it is of considerable benefit to Ireland to maintain that position. Because of our capacity on this island to make peace, to keep the peace and to keep the peace overseas, we are a small but vital voice internationally in an increasingly turbulent world. It is time to find it and to use it to voice our concern regarding the Libyan Coast Guard and Libya being considered a safe point of return. Along with commenting on my earlier point around any potential conflict of operational interest, I would appreciate if the Tánaiste could respond to that in his summing up. My comrade, Deputy Carthy, has already outlined his concerns, and I am sure the Tánaiste will address those too.

We also saw the huge pride the Naval Service men and women had on their return from Operation Sophia and in the part they played in saving lives at sea. I want the Naval Service men and women to feel that same pride in themselves on their return from Operation Irini.

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