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Showing posts with label arms. Show all posts
Showing posts with label arms. Show all posts

Saturday, December 23, 2006

School kids trade arms here in Ireland - Afterschool Arms School

3:13 PM 0
In April of this year the Leaving Certificate students of Colaiste Chríost Ri in Portlaoise set up a company called 'Seachtar" to buy and sell arms.

Even more shockingly they did this legally as Ireland has some of the weakest arms control legislation in the EU. Despite the thousands who died in the troubles we don't bother to restrict the control of deadly arms or torture devices such as thumbs cuffs, leg irons and stun sticks.

This disgraceful situation was highlighted by UK activist Mark Thomas in a programme for Channel 4. Using pupils from the UK to trade guns he discovered that in the UK a licence was required to trade guns but not required in Ireland. So he got pupils to travel over and use their mobile phones at the side of the road here in the republic of Ireland.

Mark Thomas also used pupils in Ireland to buy and sell arms, importing them to Ireland and exporting them to contacts all over the world without question or hinderence from the Irish Government. To do this he secured the cooperation of six schoolgirls and Sr Barbara Raftery. They were so good at trading that they were asked to become agents for Korean electro-shock equipment dealers.

This is more than just a possiblity it is acutally happening and Ireland is being used to faciliate this deadly trade. According to Amensty International (Ireland) "arms brokers operating out of Ireland, despite clear evidence linking them to shipments to Liberia, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sierra Leone."

What also surprised me and disapointed me was the lack of coverage of the story and the lack of public outcry though some paper's did cover it and the Irish Times did an excellent follow-up interview here.

The programme was called ‘After School Arms Club’ was screened by Channel 4, as part of their Dispatches series on Monday April 3rd.

Download the video here (it takes five minutes on Broadband if you are lucky enough to live somewhere that you can get Broadband). This download is courtesy of Indybay.org

For more information visit the After School Arms Club and read the article by Mark Thomas entitled Mark Thomas - plays "let's start an arms company"
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Thursday, December 21, 2006

Blix says US has wrong attitude over Weapons of Mass Destruction

12:22 PM 0
The Chairman of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, Dr Hans Blix says that the EU's strategy for preventing the spread of nuclear weapons is more effective than that of the current United States administration. He said the Bush administration saw armed force as legitimate in the pursuit of political aims.

Whereas the EU sought to deal with the issues concerned the US liked to lecture nations like the 70 million strong Iran about nuclear weapons which it itself stockpiles in thousands, while at the same time including Iran in the so-called 'Axis of Evil', which Blix said, may play well “back home in Wyoming" but did nothing to help resolve the problem.

Mr Blix was speaking at his recent address to the National Forum on Europe on the EU's role in dealing with the proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction.

In my opinion it would seem that the problem with WMD and in particular Nuclear Weapons is that they are still "sexy". Any developing nation who wants to be taken seriously wants to join the nuclear club. The fact that there are still stockpiles of such weapons in the US, UK, Russia, France and a host of other former "Great" powers means that tin pot dictators like the odious Kim Jong Il are pursuing nuclear programmes.

Mind you it is not hard to see why Iran wants the bomb. America, who has been no great friend to Iran over the last couple of decades, has just kicked the hell out of Iraq, Iran's next door neighbour.

It has 140,000 troops in Iraq at the moment and is sending another 15,000 to 30,000 troops next week and also anywhere between 5,000 to 10,000 troops in Saudi Arabia. From its bases all over the world (like Chagos) it can send B52 bombers to bomb anyone, anywhere and in the case of Iraq and Afghanistan has done so repeatedly.

If you were Iran wouldn't you want a nuclear bomb to ward the Americans off with as well?

While Iran is vilified by the US as being a paid up member of the 'Axis of Evil' it is important to remember that Iran is a democracy. At the moment its government is conservative but its last President was a liberal.

70% of Iran's population are under 30, they are much open to the west and in my opinion it is only a matter of a decade or less before they start dismantling the current conservative and religious dominated culture they have at present (just like we did here in Ireland).

Iran's economy is also predicted to become one of the biggest in the region in the coming decade so things are looking good for Iran.

However, with so many changes taking place within the country and such instability in the area it is no wonder that the Iranian government is nervous.

Iran needs reassurance, reassurance that its sovereignty will be respected and that it will be allowed to develop as its democratic system allows and directs. That's all any nation wants, isn't it?



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