Greens ask Taoiseach to stop paying for US military overflights

national | miscellaneous | news report Wednesday February 12, 2003 23:15 by Graham Caswell - Green Party caswell at indigo dot ie

Press Release

Green Party Leader, Trevor Sargent TD, today pressed the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to say how far he will go in supporting the Bush war against Iraq.

"Already Ireland is paying for military overflights and communication charges on behalf of the US military, to the value of over a million euro a year. Regardless of the UN, Anglo American warplanes are presently bombing northern
Iraq and blatantly flouting international law. Meanwhile the Irish taxpayer is, in effect, helping to fund this aggression against a people with 16 million on the verge of starvation," said Deputy Sargent.

The Green Party Leader also asked the Taoiseach if he would approve use of nuclear weapons as planned for by the Pentagon. "Where would he draw the line? Would he, for example, tell the President of the U.S. that he is not prepared to back the use of nuclear weapons, for which the Pentagon has planned, not as retaliation for the use of chemical, biological or other weaponry, but to penetrate a bunker? Would he tell President Bush that this is a bridge too far and that he cannot support the use of weapons of mass destruction in getting rid of mass destruction?"

In reply the Taoiseach adopted a wait and see approach but refused to answer the questions. "Our line is to see what the UN Security Council will do," stated the Taoiseach.