Results 5,441-5,460 of 6,030 for speaker:Brendan Ryan

Seanad: Order of Business. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: We agree most of the time.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: Hear, hear.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: Not a chance.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I doubt if the world is sincere about avoiding conflicts like this in the future, but if it is it must put an end to the arms trade. Every one of the conflicts in the course of my adult life has been spectacularly exacerbated by the determination of a small number of powerful rich countries, of different claims in terms of ideology, to sell weapons to countries they neither needed nor could...

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: That has nothing to do with it.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: If law was based on the judgment of participants, there would be no law at all. Law is applied universally, even-handedly and independently and if there is no independence, there is no law. This action in the Middle East implies there is no law, except the law of brute force.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: There is no law.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I thank you, a Chathaoirligh, I was feeling very threatened. I refer to the statements that America is our closest friend and is the champion of freedom in the world. Senator Norris stated previously that America subverted democracy in Iran and Guatemala in the 1950s. In the 1960s it subverted democracy in Chile, in the 1970s it participated in the subversion of democracy all over South...

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: Central and eastern Europe collapsed because of the remarkable vision of a Soviet president.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I did not witness US intervention when Soviet tanks crushed the people of Hungary in 1956 or when they crushed freedom in Czechoslovakia in 1968. In both cases the US decided its own interests were better served by leaving tyranny alone.

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: We had a Government in the 1980s which was not afraid to tell the US what it thought of its foreign policy. It was a led by Garrett FitzGerald and Peter Barry was Minister for Foreign Affairs. They told Ronald Reagan in Dublin Castle that what he was doing in central America was wrong. We do not always have to toady up to the US when it engages in actions that are wrong. One does not get...

Seanad: Foreign Conflicts: Motion. (21 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I move amendment No. 2: To delete all words after "Seanad Éireann" and substitute the following: –Notes the decision of the United States, the United Kingdom and others to launch a pre-emptive military strike against Iraq in defiance of the United Nations Charter; –Condemns the threat or use of war, especially before diplomatic alternatives have been exhausted; –Notes with alarm the...

Seanad: Order of Business. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: In October 2001 a large number of letters arrived in Leinster House. They were in a large, addressed envelope which was sealed but not franked. However, the letters it contained were franked. Because of the anthrax scare they were taken away by the Garda, opened, kept in its possession and used as evidence to charge a member of the force with a breach of discipline. I understand the charge...

Seanad: Order of Business. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: It was an outrage against humanity. As long as such incidents happen, there is no moral basis for those who claim to be defending decent values in Baghdad. How can an ally of the United States tolerate the deliberate murder of an innocent peace activist? Accidents can happen and war is rough but this was murder in regard to which we should be prepared to take a moral position. Regrettably, it...

Seanad: Order of Business. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: For one moment my hopes rose.

Seanad: Order of Business. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: Yes. Amendment put: "That all Stages of No. 3 be taken before No. 1." Tá

Seanad: Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill 2003: Report and Final Stages. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I second the amendment. To a certain extent I agree with Senator Mansergh that there is some wrecking taking place, but it is being done by the Government. For a long time it hid behind the fact that there were little details that needed to be tidied up, then it hid behind the report of the so-called high level group, and then it pretended that it had informally consulted the Information...

Seanad: Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill 2003: Report and Final Stages. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: The fact that Mrs. Thatcher was wrong about most things should never be used as a dismissal of her capabilities. Her real tragedy was that she was both capable and wrong.

Seanad: Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill 2003: Report and Final Stages. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: I do not think the Minister would deny that he ever said it.

Seanad: Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill 2003: Report and Final Stages. (20 Mar 2003)

Brendan Ryan: That is what I thought. I thank the Minister for promoting me. I keep trying.