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

I saw that the British ambassador to Ireland has taken a break from Twitter after saying he had been subject to abuse on the basis of his nationality. Obviously, nobody should be subject to abuse on Twitter or elsewhere and people are free to join or leave social media platforms as they wish. However, it is worth noting what he was referring to. He tweeted saying, “Had it not been for NATO operations... many people in the former Yugoslavia and Afghanistan would not be alive today”. That was in response to the protests at the so-called consultative forum. He was met with much correct criticism on NATO, with people making the very obvious point that if it was not for those NATO interventions, many more people would still be alive today. I refer to the war crimes committed by NATO, including the bombing of the television station in Belgrade, described by Amnesty International as a war crime, and the thousands and thousands of civilian deaths in Yugoslavia and in Afghanistan, not to mention hundreds of thousands as a consequence in the Middle East. Is it not fair enough that if someone intervenes in our foreign policy debate that they are going to get a robust response and debate from people?

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