Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail)
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77. To ask the Minister for Defence if it his intention to deepen the Defence Forces participation in any UN mission in Mali; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21299/13]

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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81. To ask the Minister for Defence if he is preparing to send members of the Defence Forces to serve in an UN peacekeeping in Mali; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21128/13]

Michael Colreavy (Sligo-North Leitrim, Sinn Fein)
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83. To ask the Minister for Defence if he will provide an update in the current Defence Forces participation in the training mission in Mali. [21283/13]

Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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87. To ask the Minister for Defence if he will provide a progress report on the Defence Forces mission to Mali; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21318/13]

Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
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97. To ask the Minister for Defence the timeframe the most recently deployed personnel to Mali will be based there. [21291/13]

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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I propose to answer Questions Nos. 77, 81, 83, 87 and 97 together.

I addressed the question of possible Defence Forces' participation in the newly established United Nations' multidimensional integrated stabilisation mission in Mali in my reply to a priority question.

On 17 January 2013, the Council of the European Union established the EU training mission, EUTM Mali, which was formally launched by the EU Foreign Affairs Council on 18 February 2013. Its initial mandate is to last for 15 months. The purpose of the mission is to provide military training and advice to the Malian armed forces in order to improve their capacity to maintain security in Mali and restore the authority of the Malian Government and the territorial integrity of the Malian State. Twenty-two member states are contributing over 500 troops, including 250 instructors and additional military personnel to EUTM Mali. Personnel deployed to the mission will not be involved in combat operations.

On 26 February 2013, the Government approved the deployment of approximately eight members of the Permanent Defence Force for service with the EU training mission in Mali. Three officers and five non-commissioned officers were deployed to EUTM Mali on 23 March 2013 for a tour of duty of approximately five months. One officer, of lieutenant colonel rank, has been appointed camp commandant of the Koulikoro training camp, while one commandant is employed in the mission headquarters in Bamako. The remaining six personnel also deployed to Koulikoro form part of a joint infantry training team with the United Kingdom armed forces. Training for the first group of 650 Malian armed forces personnel commenced on 2 April 2013 and is progressing well.

The Defence Forces training team will train two platoons of Malian personnel during its tour of duty and is due to rotate in early September.

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail)
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We welcome the relative progress achieved in Mali, particularly northern Mali, in recent times. We pay tribute to the French and the approximately 6,000 African-led troops who have been involved in the initiatives. Will the Minister inform the House whether he himself is in favour of sending Irish troops to Mali and indicate if approximately 400 soldiers is the number in question? Will he indicate when he will bring formal proposals to the Cabinet on the matter?

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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Like Deputy Finian McGrath, Deputy Seán Ó Fearghaíl gives a little too much credence to the nonsense he reads in Phoenix. There has been no decision about numbers of troops. I dealt with this issue at some length. There is a United Nations proposal for a mission. As I indicated in my earlier reply, we are considering technical areas in which we can provide personnel. The matter is being assessed within the Defence Forces and no decision of any description has been made as to whether we will participate in the mission.

My personal view is that the mission is important. If we can help to bring stability and peace to the area, we should make a positive contribution. I await recommendations from within the Defence Forces as to whether there are areas within which we can assist the mission and whether we should provide personnel. I have no idea from where the figure of 400 might have come other than the brain of some journalist who felt the need to fill space in a particular periodical. I always find it interesting when people write authoritatively that definitive decisions have been made on matters I am dealing with when no decision of any description has yet been made.

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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I note that the Minister is at least an avid reader of Phoenix.

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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It is something at which one can laugh with great regularity.

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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Is the Minister stating he has received no formal request under MINUSMA and United Nations Resolution S/RES 2100? I missed the earlier reply.

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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Yes, that is what I said.

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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I missed the reply to Deputy Mick Wallace. Can the Minister provide any indication of the number of troops he envisages becoming involved? He mentioned a figure of 22 and the training element. My understanding is that Mali may receive the third largest United Nations deployment in recent decades after the deployments to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Darfur. It will, therefore, be a major operation.

People are aware of Mali's history and economic circumstances. It is one of the world's poorest countries. They are aware of its general society and the threat from at least some organisations with connections to al-Qaeda. Is the Minister concerned about the State becoming involved in the French post-colonial system in north Africa? As he knows, France has had a long-standing role in Francophone countries and often supported powerful dictatorships and regimes which oppressed their own peoples. Does the Minister have concerns that Ireland could become implicated in this regard? He mentioned Partnership for Peace. It is fair to say, notwithstanding earlier comments, that people have concerns about this country being involved in NATO missions.

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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This country will not become involved in anyone's adventures anywhere. We do not get involved in adventures. We have a tradition of which we should be proud in the House and which we should never misrepresent of having enormously competent Defence Forces which bring special skills to peacekeeping and which are widely recognised globally. We punch substantially above our weight to deploy small contingents in different parts of the world, often with individual members of the Defence Forces being placed in command of troops from a broad range of countries.

I am very proud of the engagements and the competence of those engagements. I do not want to upset the Deputy but I do not know why people are hung up about NATO. The Cold War was over a long time ago and NATO is effectively a regional organisation that has a substantial role and is recognised by the UN as one of the regional organisations that takes a lead role in peacekeeping and peace enforcement missions, as does its equivalent in the African states and the European Union as an entity. There is an important role to be played in the area.

I do not know if we will participate in the mission because I am waiting for feedback from our defence organisation looking at a range of skills that the UN requested to be incorporated and provided by personnel in the mission. This is an enormously troubled part of the world. The French deserve praise for the speed with which they intervened in circumstances of horrendous atrocities being perpetrated by fundamentalists and al-Qaeda groups in northern Mali. These posed a serious threat to the whole of the country and without the French intervention those groups would have spread further. There are issues with the Malian army because there have been substantial human rights violations by the groups that took over northern Mali and human rights violations by the official Malian forces. These are the subject of investigation at the moment and there is an important role to play to ensure the restructuring of the civil government structure in Mali takes place and that elections take place so that a Government can be democratically elected in July. It is important that there are forces to back the civil power that are competent, are disciplined and trained and do not engage in human rights abuses.

The additional issue in the context of the UN mission is maintaining peace in a troubled area. Even with the engagement of the French, there has been a number of incidents in northern Mali in recent weeks. The conflict will not disappear overnight. We have an international duty to the civilian population to provide it with the protection it requires in a troubled area and a poor country. It needs a great deal more help than simply military help but we should not have turned our backs on the difficulties of the country and the ordinary people in it and, given that this is a European security issue, ignored the difficulties posed to Europe in the medium term had a fundamentalist group entirely taken over Mali, conducted itself in gross violation of the human rights of the population of Mali, planted itself in the country and posed a threat to other countries in the region and to Europe.

Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein)
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Northern Africa has a colonial history and was carved up by a number of countries, most notably Britain, France and Spain. It is a tragic history of the pillage of natural resources, genocide and oppression over many decades. That is the context of engagement in north Africa. France was very slow out of the blocks in Tunisia when the people had their uprising and removed the dictator Ben Ali. The French went into Libya but there was major criticism of NATO's interpretation of the UN Security Council resolution and devastating consequences in the country. We are all glad to see the back of Gaddafi but the question is whether it could have been managed better. That is the context in which we move into Mali.

It is disappointing we did not have a proper debate in the House because fewer than 12 of our Defence Forces were deployed, meaning there is no proper scrutiny of the decision over a period of time. The Minister acknowledges the Malian army is responsible for numerous reported human rights abuses, followed up by the UN, Human Rights Watch and other human rights NGOs. There are serious concerns.

This is not a blue-helmet operation in which we are involved. It is not comparable to Lebanon. We are taking sides in this conflict. We are operating with other armies which are under the NATO umbrella and the concern is that this could be interpreted as having a negative impact on Ireland's declared neutrality, which is something of which we are immensely proud. We are immensely proud of our troops who have served in blue-helmet operations throughout the world. That is the concern. What does the Minister say to all of that? Is he reviewing this decision or is he pursuing it despite all of these concerns?

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The first question to ask is what it is that Deputy Mac Lochlainn wants us to be neutral over. Should we be neutral when fundamentalist groups are killing people, chopping off their limbs and raping women? Is that something about which we are neutral? I am not neutral about that. I think we need to be of assistance to stop such atrocities happening. Let us not get lost in ideology in this area. Let us look at the reality of what was happening on the ground in Mali. There has been reference to what the French have done. What the French have done has received a broad welcome, internationally and in Africa.

I made reference in one of my earlier responses to AFISMA, the African troops who are trying to provide assistance in Mali. The current strength of the UN-authorised African-led support mission in Mali is 6,300 troops. It is the biggest group there. The mission was authorised not by NATO, as some sort of NATO junket, but under UN Security Council Resolution 2085 of 20 December 2012. That resolution is the basis on which the AFISMA group was deployed to Mali in January 2013 by the Economic Community of West African States, which is playing an important role. Additional troops are required and that is why there will be an extended UN mission. That is why it is hoped there will be additional participants, but there will still be a major African element. It will not be taken over as a European UN mission, but we in Europe have a contribution to make. In fact, one of the complaints I have made about the European Union, which I brought to the attention of my defence colleagues in Europe and which we are now addressing actively in the context of the Irish Presidency, is that European Union countries have made substantial financial contributions over the years to UN missions but have been poor in contributing troops to UN peacekeeping missions. We need to participate and utilise our skills to achieve or secure peace in troubled parts of the globe.

It is worth drawing Deputy Mac Lochlainn's attention to the fact that the role of AFISMA was to assist the Malian army in securing full territorial control throughout the country, which it could not do without the assistance of the French. Progress has been made in taking back the main cities in both the north and centre of the country.

Let us not get lost in ideology. I am not neutral when children are being dragooned at the age of ten into armies. I am not neutral when women are being raped. I am not neutral when people are being blown up. I am not neutral when people are being persecuted for religious reasons. I do not recognise that as a form of neutrality that has any particular merit. Irish neutrality has an important role in that we are not seen as having a colonial past. We are seen as being independent interlocutors in troubled regions, without any post-colonial agenda. I am not saying anyone else has such an agenda, but because of some countries' history in different regions, even when they act in good faith and with integrity, the way they act is often open to misinterpretation. That is the benefit of our neutrality: we can play the honest broker and participate in peacekeeping missions without anyone being suspicious of ulterior motive, and long may we continue to play that role.

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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In reply to the Minister's remarks, nobody in the House is neutral about atrocities-----

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Hear, hear.

Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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-----or misbehaviour by regimes or groups that want to impose their ideological view on people. None of us is neutral in that regard. Have there been references, to the Minister's knowledge, to the International Criminal Court in respect of events in Mali?

We noted at the start of the conflict the damage that was done. Mali has an incredible cultural heritage, as the Minister knows. It has UNESCO sites and, along with ourselves, it probably has musicians among the best on the planet. For many cultural reasons, Mali is an important country. Owing to Mali's French colonial history, as articulated by other Members, there are concerns that we could be sucked into a conflict that ultimately would not be in the interest of this country. Would this be of concern to the Minister as the decision is made on whether to participate?

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy raised some very important human rights issues. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights produced a report that makes a number of recommendations to the various actors involved in resolving the crisis in Mali with the aim of protecting the civilian population and promoting national reconciliation. The recommendations include ensuring that all perpetrators of human rights violations committed during the crisis are brought to justice. That is an important issue. The second, to which I made reference, is ensuring that all security forces receive training on the principles of international human rights and humanitarian law. This is where we have an active engagement.

The situation in Mali was referred from the Government of Mali on 30 July 2012 to the International Criminal Court. After conducting a preliminary examination of the situation, including an assessment of the admissibility of potential cases, the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP, determined that there was a reasonable basis to proceed with an investigation. On 16 January 2013, the OTP opened an investigation into alleged crimes committed on the territory of Mali since January 2012. This decision is the result of the preliminary examination of the circumstances in Mali that the office had been conducting since July 2012. In the course of the preliminary examination, the office identified potential cases of sufficient gravity to require further action. It has been determined that there is a reasonable basis to believe the following crimes were committed, not only by government troops: murder; mutilation, cruel treatment and torture; and intentionally directed attacks against protected objects, which Deputy Broughan referred to in mentioning the culture of Mali. Much of this has to do with what happened at the hands of the fundamentalists in northern Mali, but this investigation included any allegations made against the troops of the Malian army. Other crimes listed in the report include the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court. Deputy McGrath expressed concern about executions carried out by fundamentalists for alleged criminal activity without any proper trials. Reference was also made to pillaging and, more important, rape.

Based on the information gathered to date, the investigation will focus on crimes committed in the three northern regions of Mali, namely, Gao, Kidal and Timbuktu. EU foreign Ministers have welcomed the announcement by the OTP that an investigation such as I have described is taking place. Lest it be believed that, in the context of the roles of this State, the Irish Presidency, my Ministry or the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, we have ignored any of these issues, I stress that not only have we not ignored them, we have welcomed the engagement of the court in examining allegations of a very serious nature that have been made and examining the background to atrocities that are clearly documented, including by film in some instances, and which clearly occurred in the past 16 to 17 months in the very troubled country of Mali.