Shannon War Port - Aussies, Brits, Yanks & FF AGM

national | anti-war / imperialism | news report Friday October 10, 2003 20:07 by Ciaron - Dublion Catholic Worker

OZ Senate Censures PM on War On Eve of King George Visit

The Australian Senate has censured Prime Minister Howard on the eve of the Bush visit. Robin Cook resigned as minister recently stating Britain went to war because Blair found easier to stand up to British public opinion than to stand up to Bush. 92,617 US troops passed through Shannon on the way to war sinnce Jan 1st,Irish Govt spent 1.82 million euro defending the militarised airport from the peace movement, Aer Rianta made 11 million euro blood money, disarmament activists face up to 10 years accused of 4 million euro "crim dam" (sic). Will there be a dissenting voice at the FF AGM. How colonised and housebroken are these people? A moral message of neutrality, anti-colonialism, peace and justice to the Irish diaspora in the U.S. would/could be significant.

Senate censure PM over war
October 7, 2003

THE Senate today censured Prime Minister John Howard for misleading the people of Australia over the reasons for going to war with Iraq.

The Opposition, Greens and Australian Democrats voted together to defeat the government by 33 votes to 30.

The censure motion was initially proposed by Greens Senator Bob Brown but amended by Labor.

Senator Brown said Mr Howard was involved in an unprecedented deceit of the nation and deserved censure.

He said Mr Howard had declared that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and support of international terrorism threatened Australia and its people.

"It was under those those circumstances of imminent, direct, undeniable and lethal threat to the Australian people that Prime Minister Howard asked our defence forces to take part in the invasion of Iraq," he said.

"It has become abundantly clear that the prime minister was not just a bit wrong. He was totally wrong."

Defence Minister Robert Hill said the Australian government and others believed Saddam Hussein's weapons programs was a very real danger.

"The issues are important but the process Senator Brown has adopted today is nothing more than a stunt and should be treated as such," he said.

"There is certainly no basis to censure the prime minister. If there is a basis for anything it's to applaud the fact that we have a prime minister who has the courage to take difficult decisions."

Opposition Senate Leader John Faulkner said Mr Howard had been loose with the truth and deserved censure.

"He really ought to admit he misled the nation over the reason for taking Australia into the war with Iraq," he said.

"The bottom line is you do not announce your country is going to war, you don't announce that you are committing Australian defence Force personnel to a war zone using what are increasingly looking like false pretexts.

"That is not on. You have to be sure what you are doing is right and is being done for the right reasons. I say Mr Howard was not sure. He was very loose with the truth."

Democrats Senator Lyn Allison said few Australians would dispute that they had been lied to over the pre-emptive attack on Iraq.

"It's quite possible our prime minister and our minister for foreign affairs were also lied to. I accept that this is a strong possibility," she said.

"So keen were they to join the US on the world stage and strut their stuff that I believe this government didn't care."

AAP