Anthony McIntyre's Blog, page 1153

The Fake Enemy

The Uri Avnery Column looks at the tension between Israel and Iran.


The joke tells about the Hungarian ambassador in Washington who delivered his declaration of war to the Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, who decided to have some fun.

"Hungary, Hungary," Hull queried, "Are you a republic?"

"No," the ambassador corrected him, "We are a monarchy."

"Indeed? So who is your king?"

"We don't have a king, but a regent, Admiral Horthy."

"An admiral? So you have a large navy?"

"We have no navy at all, because we have no outlet to the ocean."

"Strange, a monarchy without a king, an admiral without a navy. So tell me, why are you declaring war on us? Do you have claims against the USA?"

"No, we have claims against Romania."

"So why don't you declare war on Romania?"

"We can't! Romania is our ally!"

I Remember this joke every time Binyamin Netanyahu utters his blood-curdling threats against Iran. The struggle with Iran heads his agenda. He warns of the danger of an Iranian effort to produce nuclear weapons and implicitly threatens her with our “secret” nuclear arsenal.

Why?

God knows. I search desperately for a reason for the Israeli-Iranian conflict, a struggle of life and death, and do not find any. Nothing. Niente.

Wars between nations are based on conflicts of interest. Are there any conflicting interests between Israel and Iran?

None whatsoever.

Israel has a conflict with the Arab world, which refuses to recognize and have normal relations with it as long as there is no peace between Israel and the Palestinian people. Israel is now practically at war with Syria and Hezbollah.

Iran wants to be the dominant Muslim power in the region. Therefore it is practically at war with Saudi Arabia (which wants the same) and its satellites. That looks like a community of interests between Israel and Iran.

And indeed, not so long ago there was a strong – though unofficial – alliance between Iran and Israel. That was when the Shah ruled in Teheran. Israelis acted in Iran at will. Iran was the basis for Israel's extensive military and political activities in Iraqi Kurdistan. Shabak, the Israeli secret service, trained the feared Iranian secret service, Savak. Except for the USA, Iran was Israel's closest ally.

So What happened? Regime change in Iran, of course. The Shah was thrown out, the Ayatollahs came in. The Ayatollahs are religious leaders. In the name of Shi'ite Islam they curse the "Jewish State".

But religious ideology does not replace the basic interests of a state. These are based on objective facts, primarily geographical ones. Even the religious wars of the 17th century arose mainly from national interest. Mostly, religion was just a pretext.

National interests do not change when a regime change occurs.

The most obvious example is Russia. When the Bolshevik revolution replaced the Czars, foreign policy did not change. When the Communist regime broke down and power eventually came to Vladimir Putin, the foreign policy continues more or less as if nothing has happened.

And indeed, when the vital interests of Iran were concerned, the Ayatollahs did not despise Israeli aid. During the Iraqi-Iranian war, Israel provided the ayatollahs with arms. That happened almost openly during the so-called "hostage crisis". The US sent arms to Israel, Israel sent them to Iran, in return Iran released the American hostages. My friend Amiram Nir, then a government security official, went to Teheran to deliver them.

The thought that Iran could possibly attack a nuclear power like Israel and risk its own annihilation is ludicrous.

Iran is the heiress to one of the world's most ancient civilizations, almost as ancient as Egypt. Compared to it, Jewish civilization is a younger sister. Indeed, many experts believe that the Jewish religion is heavily indebted to the Iranian civilization.

Cyrus "the Great" founded the largest empire in the world (until then). He created a system of tolerance and progress. As part of the effort he sent the banished Jews from Babylon back to Jerusalem. The "Return to Zion" was, as many experts believe, the real beginning of Judaism.

True, that was long, long ago. But, as mentioned above, objective interests have a very long life.

So Why do the Iranians curse us now? Why do they rain fire and brimstone on us?

Quite simple. The hatred for Israel is for the Iranians an instrument for the achievement of their real goals.

The real aim of the Iranians is to gain power over the entire Muslim Middle East. They are doing this systematically, with quite a lot of success. The logic goes like this: the Muslim world hates Israel. The Arab Middle East hates Israel. Therefore, the hatred of Israel can be an effective political instrument.

Curiously enough, Binyamin Netanyahu has adopted the same logic – only the other way round. Donald trump hates the ayatollahs. Many people in the Western world fear them. So Netanyahu has adopted hatred of Iran as his main political instrument. He goes around the world and peddles it everywhere. It is the main theme of his rousing speeches to the UN, the American Congress and AIPAC.

It is also a good remedy for his personal troubles. Netanyahu is now up to his neck in various corruption affairs, including large bribes. His admirers are ready to ignore them, because he is Israel's only bulwark against the terrible danger of annihilation by the ayatollahs riding on nuclear missiles.

Since President Trump also has a thing about Iran and wants to withdraw from the international agreement in which Iran undertook to suspend much of its nuclear program, in return for adequate concessions, Netanyahu's anti-Iranian ranting cements the companionship between the two.

Lately the Iranians have been establishing bases in Syria and Lebanon, near the borders of Israel. The Israeli air force is bombing them from time to time, proudly showing aerial photos proving their success. These attacks raise, of course, Iran's credibility in Arab eyes. Everybody is satisfied.

Still, It's a dangerous situation. It is based on the Israeli-Arab conflict that could explode any minute in various ways. Israeli "military experts" prophesy another Israeli-Arab war soon, probably against Syria and Hezbollah. This week, air-raid sirens were tested all over this country.

The best way to avoid it is to make peace with the Arab world. That means to make peace first with the Palestinians.

Netanyahu proudly tells us that he has achieved a remarkable victory – cooperation with Saudi Arabia and the Arab Emirates, who are now involved in a shooting war with Yemeni insurgents who enjoy Iranian backing. The Saudis are nowhere near to winning that war.

This Israeli-Saudi cooperation is strictly secret. The Saudi crown prince, a very young and inexperienced dictator, cannot admit it, because the masses of Arabs everywhere, including his own kingdom, see Israel as the arch-enemy.

No Arab country can establish real peace with Israel, as long as Israel occupies all of Palestine and subjects the Palestinians to a cruel occupation regime. The old Saudi peace plan is still lying around somewhere, but it is totally ignored by the Israeli government.

True, Israel has signed peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan, but nothing even remotely resembling a thoroughgoing peace exists between us and these nations. The initial enthusiasm evaporated long ago, and both the Egyptian and the Jordanian governments keep relations to a minimum, aware that the masses of their peoples detest Israel.

There is just no way around the Palestinians.

Real friends of Israel should advise Netanyahu to make peace as long as Mahmoud Abbas (Abu-Mazen) is still around. In two weeks he will be 83 years old, and he is ailing. He is deeply committed to peace. He has no obvious successor, and his replacement may be far, far less moderate.

But Netanyahu doesn't care. Peace is the last thing he has on his troubled mind. He is far more committed to the eternal conflict with both the Arabs and the Iranians.

After all, what would life be like without enemies?


Uri Avnery is a veteran Israeli peace activist. He writes @ Gush Shalom

Is The Right To Life A “Women’s Issue”?

Dr Anne Mc Closkey explores the role of men in the debate around the abortion question.



The notion that the removal of the constitutional protection for the right to life of unborn children is purely a “woman’s issue” makes no sense. Abortion, by definition kills the unborn child, and robust studies now show that it can cause real and lasting harm to women also. But it also affects fathers, extended families and wider society.

If the child in the womb is just a part of the woman’s body, then what is a father? The very concept of fatherhood, with all that it entails, is reduced to mere sperm donation. We are each created by a 50:50 mix of DNA from both of our parents, and inherit physical and mental characteristics going back generations from both families. My mother was beautiful, but I unfortunately am a ringer for my father.

When their child’s life is ended by induced abortion, men are often left bereaved and traumatised by a decision they have no control over, and in my experience often suffer the same grieving process as they would following a natural miscarriage. I don’t know of any research in this field, but in seems likely that at least some of the excess mental health problems we see among males are related to this loss of role as fathers, and equal partners in parenthood.

The narrative that the unborn child is not a new life created by both parents, but merely part of the woman’s body and subject to her autonomy alone is one which many men do not accept, and with good reason. For others, abortion absolves them from responsibility for the outcomes of sexual activity. I haven’t come across a pregnancy yet that didn’t have male input. Men surely have a responsibility not to put the women they claim to care for at risk of unplanned pregnancy. What about her bodily autonomy?

I hear there is a new group called “Lads for Choice”. Lads offer their women abortion, whereas real men cherish and care for them. Abortion offers men what James Joyce called “copulation without procreation” - the opportunity to use women as mere objects of gratification, without regards for the consequences. Recent high profile court cases on both sides of the Atlantic demonstrate how many “lads” hold these deeply misogynistic ideas about women and their value in society. The cover of “choice” is also a useful tool to hide abuse, violence, exploitation, trafficking and other crimes against women and children.

For the vast majority of our people, fathers are their friends, mentors and role models, a central and irreplaceable part of their lives. Similarly, for most, our partners are equal collaborators in life’s journey. They are the co-creators of our children, and share responsibility for their health and wellbeing.

Irish men need to consider carefully before subscribing to the narrative of militant feminism to describe their lives. In the upcoming referendum, they should vote to defend their role as fathers, and to preserve the lives of their children and those of unborn generations of Irish men and women.

Cherish all the Children Equally.


Anne Mc Closkey works as a GP in Derry. Lifelong republican and community activist, mother and grandmother, stood as Independent candidate in 2016 Assembly election, polling over 3k 1st preference votes, founder member of Cherish all the Children Equally, a republican progressive organisation founded to give pro-life socialists and Republicans a voice and to campaign against repeal of the constitutional right to life in 8th amendment.

The Eighth Amendment And Human Rights Standards: Irish Abortion Law In An International Context

Barry Gilheany looks at the abortion issue from the perspective of international law.


By contrast I illustrate how Post-Eighth Amendment Irish law has constructed women seeking terminations of pregnancy and their support agencies as alternatively bad actors, virtual wards of court without autonomy and agency or subjects in need of charity or mercy not justice. Such case law increasingly brought the Irish state into conflict with international human rights bodies to which it is a signatory with resultant reputational damage to the Republic of Ireland's international standing. The increasing untenability of Irish case law and the outcry created by the Savita Halappanavar case in October 2012 plus the unsatisfactory nature of the 2013 Prevention of Threats to Life During Pregnancy Act has helped to radically shift the discursive terms of the Irish abortion debate making the removal of the Eighth Amendment/Article 40.3.3 and the introduction of permissive abortion legislation possible.

Arguments for a woman's right to choose to terminate a pregnancy are founded on the principles of her bodily integrity and dignity as a human being and on her adult status as a rights bearers with the agency and autonomy to make responsible life choices without deferral to traditional patriarchal authorities such as the family, Church and the medical profession. Arguments for the right to choose are increasingly being grounded on health and harm reduction arguments as every year at least 70,000 women die from complications related to unsafe abortions, according to World Health Organisation (WHO) figures (in some countries it is further estimated that unsafe abortions account for 13% of all maternal deaths and in some countries it accounts for 60% )[1]. Research carried out by the Alan Guttmacher Institute shows a clear correlation between legal abortion and abortion safety[2]. Opponents of abortion (or the right to choose abortion) argue the unborn child/foetus has the right to life from conception and therein articulate the humanity and personhood of foetal life. They have attempted to co-opt right to life protections laid out in both international and regional law to claim that foetuses bear a similar right to life. Feminists and most human rights advocates argue that such assertions violate women's fundamental rights to life, autonomy and health by imposing involuntary motherhood on women and essentially requiring women to risk their own lives for the lives of their future children[3].

An unsafe abortion is increasingly considered a major public health problem, human rights advocacy for abortion access has gained greater traction. The most explicit pronouncement of women's right to access abortion in the text of a human rights treaty is located in the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa (African Women's Protocol), adopted by the African Union on 11th July 2003. The Protocol explicitly states:

States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to … protect the reproductive rights of women by authorising medical abortion in cases of sexual assault, rape, incest, and where the continued pregnancy endangers the mental and physical health of the mother or the life of the mother or the foetus.

Thus the African Women's Protocol is the only legally binding human rights instrument to explicitly address abortion as a human right and to affirm that women's reproductive rights are human rights. But there are other international and regional human rights protections that support women's right to safe, legal abortion and in addition to the right to life and health, women's right to abortion is bolstered by the broad constellation of human rights that bolster it, such as rights to privacy, liberty, physical integrity and non-discrimination[4].

The animus behind the promotion of women's reproductive rights has largely been the work of the 1994 Cairo International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and the 1995 Beijing 1995 Fourth World UN Conference on Women. Significantly, the ICPD Programme of Action confirms that where abortion is legal, the procedure should be accessible and safe. While not explicitly calling for global legalisation of abortion, it confirms that 'women should have access to quality services for the management of abortion-related complications, and [p] ost-abortion counselling, education and family-planning services should be offered promptly, which will also help to avoid repeat abortions'. While international consensus documents are non-binding , such statements are often used to support legislative and policy reform, as well as interpretations of national and international law [5].

Treaty-monitoring bodies' interpretations and jurisprudence have also played a large role in advancing women's reproductive rights. The UN committee structure which oversees member states' compliance with each of the international human rights treaties and regional human rights monitoring systems i.e. the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) created in 1950 by the European Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Rights adopted by the Council of Europe; the Inter-American Court on Human Rights created by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights set up in 1959 as the primary human rights organ of the Organisation of American States and the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (ACPHR) established under the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights (African Charter) which was adopted by the Organisation of African Unity (now the African Union) in 1981[6].

To date, no treaty-monitoring body has explicitly recognised women's right to abortion on request or for socio-economic reasons, nor have they explicitly called for the legalisation of abortion on those grounds. However, the recognition by treaty-monitoring bodies that restrictive abortion laws may force women to resort to illegal,and therefore, unsafe, life-threatening abortions can be utilised by pro-choice advocates to support abortion on request or for socio-economic reasons as I show next[7].

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966 (ICCPR) provides an explicit pronouncement of the right to life. Article 6 (1) of the ICCPR states that : 'Every human being has the inherent right to life'. The Human Rights Committee (HRC), the ICCPR's interpretative body, stresses in General Comment No.6 (right to life) that the inherent right to life should be understood in a restrictive manner. General Comment No.6 requires States Parties to take positive action to ensure the right to life , particularly measures to increase life expectancy. Additionally, the HRC's General Comment No.28 on equality of rights between men and women asks States Parties, when reporting on the right to life protected by Article 6, 'to give information on any measures taken by the State to help women prevent unwanted pregnancies and to ensure that that they do not have to undergo clandestine abortions. General Comment No.28 also considers laws or policies where States impose a legal duty upon doctors and other health workers to report cases of women who have undergone abortion, a potential violation of the right to life (Article 6) and the right to be not to be subject to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (Article 7) [8].

The Human Rights Committee has made the link between illegal and unsafe abortions and high rates of maternal mortality. The HRC has further noted that illegal abortions have serious harmful consequences for women's lives, health and well-being. It has raised particular concerns about the criminalisation of abortion, even when the pregnancy is the result of rape and confirmed that such legislation is incompatible with women's right to life under Article 6. The HRC therefore has recommended that States Parties adopt measures to guarantee the right to life for women who decide to end their pregnancies, including ensuring the accessibility of health services and emergency obstetric care. In the HRC's 1998 Concluding Observations to Ecuador, it linked the high rate of suicide among adolescent girls and the restrictions on abortion to find them to be incompatible with adolescents' right to life, and recommended that the State Party adopt all legislative and other measures, including increasing access to adequate health and education facilities, to address the problem[9].

The HRC has also called upon States parties to amend restrictive abortion laws to help women avoid unwanted pregnancies and unsafe abortions, and to bring laws in line with the ICCPR, specifically Article 6 (right to life). For example, the HRC's Concluding Observation to Poland expressed deep concern regarding the State party's restrictive abortion law which '… incite[s] women to seek unsafe, illegal abortions, with attendant risks to their life and health'[10].

To reduce the rate of abortion and address the prevalence of unsafe abortion, the HRC has recommended increased access to family planning services and education. The HRC has also expressly referenced States' Parties duty to protect all persons' lives and education. For example, the HRC recommended that Chile amend its ban on abortion to include exceptions[11].

With respect to abortion, CEDAW explicitly frames the issue of maternal mortality as a result of unsafe abortions as a violation of women's right to life. To this end, CEDAW has recommended that States Parties increase access to family planning programmes and services, especially to reduce the number of unsafe abortions and maternal mortality rights. It has also recommended making a range of contraceptives and family planning methods more affordable, and giving social security coverage for abortion procedures. Finally, CEDAW has asked States Parties to review legislation making abortion illegal and has praised States Parties for amending their restrictive legislation[12].

Article 6 of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 (ICRC) protects children's right to life and survival. The Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) has expressed repeated concern over adolescent girls' access to safe abortion services and the need for States Parties 'to … provide access to sexual and reproductive health services … including … safe abortion services' [13].

Although the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights 1966 (ICESR) does not explicitly confer the right to life, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) has repeatedly expressed concern regarding the relationship between high rates of maternal mortality and illegal, unsafe and clandestine abortions and high maternal mortality rates and to permit or consider permitting abortion for therapeutic reasons.[14]

UN Treaty monitoring committees have expressed concern about cases regarding abortion in Ireland. Most notably in 2016 and 2017 the UN Human Rights Committee found that Ireland had violated a number of the rights of the ICPR following complaints taken by Amanda Mellet and Siobhan Whelan, both of whom experienced pregnancies with fatal foetal abnormality. In Ms Mellet's case the UNHRC found a violation of Article 7, namely the prohibition of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. The committee was of the opinion that many of these negative experiences could have been avoided had she been able to terminate her pregnancy in the familiar environment of her own country and under the care of the medical professionals whom she knew and trusted.[15]

The Committee also found a violation of Article 17, namely, protecting the right to privacy in that the interference with Ms Mellet's decision on how to cope with her unviable pregnancy was unreasonable and arbitrary. The Committee also found a violation of Article 26, namely equality before the law, due to the financial cost of travelling to the UK. Relying on the same reasons, the Committee also found in the case of Siobhan Whelan violations of Articles 7, 17 and 26; namely prohibition against cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment; protecting the right to privacy and equality before the law. The acknowledgement by the Minister of Health, Simon Harris, of the UNHRC's views, an ex gratia payment of 30,000 Euro to the aggrieved party and a detailed itemisation of the steps taken by the State on the facts of the case, further demonstrates the import of the Irish state's international legal obligations for domestic law and policies[16].

In some instances , anti-abortion/pro-life advocates have attempted to co-opt right to life protections set forth within international and regional human rights law to assert that foetuses also bear a right to life. These assertions are incompatible with women's fundamental human rights to life, health and autonomy, by imposing involuntary motherhood onto women and, in essence, requiring women to jeopardise their own lives of their future children. These claims have been defeated on various occasions within both international and regional human rights forums as shall be seen now.

For historical analyses of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 (UDHR), ICCPR and ICRC – the major international human rights treaties conferring the right to life- confirm that that right does not extend to foetuses. Article 3 of the UDHR, the first pronouncement of the right to life, specifically limits that right to those who have been 'born' In fact, the term 'born' was intentionally used to exclude the foetus or any other ante natal application of human rights. This is confirmed by the fact of the defeat of a proposed amendment to remove the term and protect the right to life from the moment of conception.
Therefore, in the context of abortion, the UDHR limits the right to life to women and girls.[17]

Likewise, the ICCPR rejects the contention that the right to life commences before birth. As with the UDHR, an amendment stating 'the right to life is inherent in the human person from the moment of conception, this right shall be protected by law' was rejected. The HRC has also repeatedly called upon States Parties to liberalise laws which criminalise abortion, a position which negates any supposed right to life for foetuses.[18]

Foetal claims to the right to life brought to the European human rights system have similarly been largely ineffective. When foetal rights claims have been asserted based on Article 2's substantive protections, ECHR bodies have repeatedly found that foetuses do not enjoy an absolute right to life. For example, the European Commission of Human Rights (ECtHR) confirmed in Paton v United Kingdom, that the use of the the term 'everyone' in Article 2 protecting the right to life, does not include foetuses, although it left open the question whether the 'right to life' in Article 2 might cover the 'life' of the foetus, with implied limitations. Dismissing the complaint of the husband-claimant in Paton, the ECtHR confirmed that a foetus' potential right to life did not outweigh the interests of the pregnant woman as the foetus is intimately connected with and cannot be isolated from the life of the pregnant woman.[19]

A similar claim was brought in Boso v Italy when the ECtHR found the contested abortion was not breach of Article 2. It was performed under Italian law which permitted an abortion in the first twelve weeks of pregnancy to protect the woman's physical and mental health thus striking a fair balance between the woman's interest and the state's interest in protecting the foetus. The rejection of the applicant's claim rested partially on the fact that Italy's law protects the health of pregnant women. Since both abortion laws in these cases were fairly permissive, it is unclear whether the ECHR would likewise defer to Member States with less liberal abortion legislation[20].

Thus while the ECtHR has affirmed that foetuses do not possess an absolute right to life, the Court has not ruled unequivocally whether Article 2's protections apply to foetuses, and therefore avoiding any conclusion which may impinge on Member States' abortion laws. When asked for the first time in Vo v France to definitively determine whether foetuses bear the right to life, it avoided doing so by noting there is no European consensus on the scientific and legal definition of the beginning of life.[21] This lack of consensus is the crux of the matter in any ethical debate over abortion and related reproductive rights.

The applicant in Vo argued that her foetus was denied the right to life based on medical negligence which led to her unanticipated therapeutic abortion. The ECtHR ultimately declined to treat the foetus as a 'person' or requiring a homicide prosecution, by deferring the issue to France, in line with the margin of appreciation doctrine. In the Court's view, the civil remedy available in French law was sufficient .[22]
I have already shown how Ireland has been in breach of UN treaty obligations on human rights by virtue of its abortion law. How does the Irish state match up to European human rights standards in respect of its abortion law? Before addressing this question, let us take a brief detour into how the abortion issue in Ireland has been constitutionalised.

The equality between the right to life of the mother and that of the foetus in Article 40.3.3 seems to relate to protection for a woman's physical survival but not her dignity. The Supreme Court judgement in the X-case overturning the enjoinder preventing her from travelling to Britain for an abortion was based on the reasoning that the minor's risk of suicide satisfied the criteria of a “real and substantial” risk to her life. So in order to align the case with the right to life that Ireland guarantees equally to women and the unborn, the Court had to ignore the young woman's agency – her refusal to have sex with her rapist and the consequent risk she might harm herself if forced to bear her rapist's child; instead the Court viewed her case as if concerned a physiological risk from pregnancy[23]. The Court explained that Article 40.3.3 should be interpreted in terms informed by the virtue of charity: “not the charity which consists of giving to the deserving, for that is justice, but the charity which is also called mercy” [24].

Constitutionalism of the abortion issue in such a form is paternalist, in its conception of women as well as the unborn. It sees women as dependents who may deserve protection; protection against injuries to their physical and emotional welfare, rather than to their autonomy. Constitutionalism in this form tends to incorporate traditional gendered role based views of women's citizenship – for example that the burdens of pregnancy are naturally assumed by women, or by women who have consented to sex, except when such burdens exceed what is normally to be expected of women, at which point women may be exempt from penal sanction for aborting a pregnancy[25].

As explained earlier the European Court of Human Rights has tended not to adjudicate on substantive claims to abortion; it makes rulings when clear and certain abortion laws are the objective of claims made to it and this was the primary focus of A,B, and C v Ireland. This case was structured on a division between substantial and procedural abortion rights which proved consequential in judgement. Applicants A and B argued but lost a substantive challenge to the Irish law, seeking to legalise abortion in the case of health. Applicant C won a procedural right to life-saving abortion, the only legal ground for abortion in Ireland[26]  - (as things stand currently of course).

Applicant C suffered from a rare form of cancer and was advised that her pregnancy might affect her prognosis and . She argued that because of the chilling nature of Irish abortion law, she could not receive accurate information about the risks of pregnancy. Her claim against the Irish state rested on the claim that legal responsibility cannot be vested solely in the medical profession 'given the lack of clarity as to what constitutes [in the words of the Supreme Court judgement in the X case] “a real and substantial risk to life” … [and] the chilling effect of severe criminal sanctions for doctors whose assessment could be considered ex post facto to fall outside that qualifying risk.[27]'.

The European Court agreed because the primary deficiency in A, B, and C was not conflicts of interpretation per se, with whom interpretive authority should lie, but that the repeated interpretations required of Irish abortion law. It found that the regulatory framework was defective not in the failure to clarify the legal grounds for abortion, nor in the absence of a resolution of the conflict over them, but in its failure to constrain the arbitrary actions of doctors – the discretion the law afforded them to impose their views on women, and to thus thwart the intentions of the law[28].

That the European Court sided in A, B, and C with the national institution is charged with rights protection, i.e. the Irish Supreme Court is no coincidence. It deliberately tracked expressions of regret by the Irish judicial authority that;

Article 40.3.3 had not been implemented by legislation … that, when enacting that Amendment, that people were entitled to believe that legislation would be introduced to regulate the manner in which the right to life of the unborn and the right to life of the mother could be reconciled.

To underline the European Court's preference for procedural rather than substantive challenges to national abortion laws, it refused the case, D v. Ireland, brought for its lack of a legal ground in Irish abortion law on foetal impairment on the grounds that the applicant had not explored all domestic avenues of redress.

Since one of the justifications given by the Pro Life Amendment Campaign in the early 1980s for inserting an anti-abortion clause into the Constitution was that it would forestall any attempt by a domestic or European Court to foist legal abortion upon an unwilling Irish populace; it is worth reflecting on a structural principle of the European human rights system: subsidiarity. Bearing in mind the touchstone issue of abortion and how it feeds into discussions on “Irishness” and Irish “identity”, the European Court affirmed in one its formative cases, (The Belgian Linguistic Case (No 2) (1968) 1 E.H.R.R, 252, at para. 10) the Court affirmed that it will not5 “assume the role of the competent national authorities … [lest it] lose weight of the subsidiarity nature of the international machinery of … the Convention”[29]. Within the system, states are to retain the primary responsibility for rights protection.
In abortion case law, the principle of subsidiarity tends to be articulated in the margin of appreciation, a doctrine by which the European Court gives state authorities great latitude to decide on the substantive content of their abortion laws. The wide margin offered to Ireland in A, B, and C was justified by the lack of consensus in Europe on the morality of abortion and by the “lengthy, complex and sensitive debate in Ireland. By dint of their constant contact and interaction with domestic,democratic deliberation, state authorities are better qualified than an international judge to balance the conflictual and competing rights and interests in an abortion law [30].

The death of Savita Halappanavar where the investigation found “an apparent over-emphasis on the need not to intervene until the foetal heart stopped together with an under-emphasis on … managing the risk of infection and sepsis in the mother” and named the lack of clear clinical guidance on lawful abortion a “material contributory factor” in the doctor's decision making silenced any arguments about the usurpation of constitutional rights of the Irish people by the European Court[31] and set in train national and international outrage over Ireland's cruel yet legally vague abortion regime.

The outcome of this latest collective national angst over abortion was the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Act 2013 which, if for nothing else, can be critiqued for its doublespeak; conservative critics feared that the procedural rights which the Act enables would rupture the right-to-life exception wide open and permit access to abortion well beyond the boundaries of the substantive law while liberalisation advocates complained that the Act does not construe access to legal abortion as a constitutional right. Rather than granting entitlements; the Act is couched in the language of permission: what is lawful and what does or does not constitute an offence. Most problematic of all the Act's procedures is certification; a woman can only access a lawful abortion on the verification of an obstetrician and a relevant specialist that there is a “real and substantial risk” to her life and in the case of suicidal ideation, the assent of three specialists is required. If she is denied permission, a woman can apply in the “prescribed form and manner” for a review of the decision and she is entitled to be heard by the review committee, the one single mention of the word in the Act[32].

In evidence given to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Eighth Amendment, the human rights scholar Christine Zampas cites the report of his visit to Ireland by the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights reporting in which he states that the Eighth Amendment to the Irish Constitution [ …] departs from the position consistently held by human rights bodies that the right to life as enshrined in relevant international treaties, does not apply to prenatal life”[33]. In addition Zampas cites a landmark case against Peru in which a sexually assaulted child was not given an abortion in part because of state measures to protect foetal life and which the UNEDW found to be violation of the Convention as conformation that foetal interests cannot trump the human rights of women and girls[34].

From feminist, human rights, justice and public health perspectives, Irish abortion law fails all procedural and substantive legal tests. The relationship between the Eighth Amendment and the case law and medical practice it has spawned and that of international human rights treaties shows that Irish abortion law is not just as an outlier but that Ireland has been a violator of the obligations it has entered into as a signatory to more than one of the six human and civil rights conventions; both on procedural and substantive grounds. The Eighth Amendment is not fit for purpose not least because it manifestly fails to do what is says on the tin: guarantee protection of life of the unborn with, as far as practicable, due regard to the equal right to life of the mother. Article 40.3.3, its sui genesis case law and the medical tragedies that have arguably been caused by it has sought to protect the physical existence of an entity with the potential for life but around which there is no consensus as to when its life actually commences and only protects, in extremis, the physical life of the pregnant woman; not her bodily integrity, dignity and capacities for agency and autonomy The Eighth Amendment's grandiloquent assertions of the sanctity of the life of the unborn says nothing about and does not encourage discussion about the quality of life before and after birth in terms of maternity care, childcare, nutrition and threats to unborn life from a future Thalidomide. Repeal of the Eighth Amendment and the passage of abortion legislation in line with the Western European norm but which balances appropriately the dignity and autonomy of the woman with societal interest in the development of foetal life will mark the moment that the Republic asserts proper sovereignty among the community of liberal democratic nations. It will have definitively cast away the shackles of British Victorian morality, ultramontane Catholicism and US Moral Majority colonisation that the Eighth Amendment really signified not; not the beacon of light of Christianity onto the decadent, secularising nations of the world that its stormtroopers proclaimed it to be.
[1]Christina Zampas and Jaime M. Gher Abortion as a Human Right – International and Regional Standards Human Rights Law Review 8:2 (2008)

[2]Alan Guttmacher Institute Abortion in Context: United States and Worldwide', May 1999, available at; http://www.guttmarcher.org/pubs/ib059...

[3]Zampas and Gher, p.262

[4]Ibid pp.250-51

[5]Ibid p.253

[6]Ibid, p.255

[7]Ibid, p.255

[8]Ibid p.256

[9]Ibid p.257

[10] Ibid p.258

[11]Ibid p.258

[12]Ibid pp.258-59

[13]Ibid p.260

[14]Ibid p.261

[15]Emily Logan Constitutional Issues Arising from the Citizens' Assembly Recommendations. Proceedings of the Joint Committee on the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution. Houses of the Oireachtas 4th October 2017

[16]Emily Logan, Ibid

[17]Zampas and Gher: p.262

[18]Zampas and Gher: p.263

[19]Zampas and Gher: p.264

[20]Zampas and Gher: p.265

[21]Zampas and Gher: p.265

[22]Zampas and Gher: p.266

[23]Reva Siegel The Constitutionalisation of Abortion pp 13-35 at pp.30-31 in Rebecca Cook, Joanna N.Erdman and Bernard M. Dickens ( 2014) Abortion Law in Transnational Perspective Philadelphia; University of Philadelphia Press Studies in Human Rights.

[24](Attorney-General v. X and others [1992] 1 IR 1, para. 32 (citing McGee v. Attorney-General [1974] IR 284, 318-9)

[25] Siegel in Cook et al p.31

[26]Johanna N. Erdman “The Procedural Turn: Abortion and the European Court of Human Rights” pp. 121-142 at p.125 in Cook et al

[27], B and C v Ireland, note 18, at para.178

[28]Erdman pp.125-26

[29]Ibid p.130

[30]Ibid, pp.130-

[31] Ibid, p.134

[32]Ibid, pp.134-35

[33]Christina Zampas Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Eight Amendment Proceedings 4th October 2017

[34]Christina Zampas, Ibid#
➽ Barry Gilheany is the author of a PhD thesis Post-Eighth Abortion Politics in the Republic of Ireland from Essex University, Department of Government. He is also the author of The Discursive Construction of Abortion in Georgina Waylen & Vicky Randall (Eds) Gender, The State and Politics Routledge, 1998. This is the first in a series of articles that he will be writing for TPQ in the course of the abortion referendum campaign in the Republic of Ireland. He is currently resident in Colchester, Essex.

Big Paddy Is Watching You

Anthony McIntyre does not think much of Paddy Jackson's attempts to gag his critics. 
Paddy Jackson while cleared of doing anything illegal with his dick seems to have learned little from his experience and is now behaving like a dick, albeit a legal one. Instead of quietly savouring his acquittal, he has opted to silence those who have vented disquiet about the verdict. His achievement will be to amplify the decibels that are already hurting his ears. Unlike Stuart Olding who wisely kicked for touch, Jackson has placed himself at the heart of a scrum from which he is unlikely to emerge unscathed.

Irish Labour Party senator Aodhán Ó Ríordáin. is being pursued by Jackson because in a tweet the politician gave out about “smug well-connected middle-class boys”.

Solicitors acting for the Irish rugby star issued a statement, casting their net much wider than Ó Ríordáin, ominously threatening all and sundry with legal action: 

We will not hesitate to repeat similar legal action against anyone, who deliberately or otherwise, sees fit to attack our client. We are examining carefully every item of social media commentary which seeks to challenge the integrity of the jury’s full endorsement of our client’s innocence. High court proceedings will issue shortly in both Belfast and Dublin.

The implication from Ó Ríordáin was that Jackson and his co-accused were acquitted not because of the nature of the evidence against them but because they benefited from class privilege. O’Riordan in offering nothing but a polemic failed to demonstrate a class bias on the part of the jury, but has instead flagged up his own: the men got away with their transgression because they were from a class different to that of Ó Ríordáin: privilege not evidence won the case. Following from that, presumably, the woman alleging rape was working class and that was the reason her testimony was rejected. With no convincing theory a conspiracy theory will plug the gaps.

Nevertheless, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin is giving expression to a much wider sentiment that Jackson can ignore only at his peril. This case and its outcome has generated considerable public curiosity and raises so many wider questions that any attempt by Jackson to smother public discussion no matter how harsh, even libellous, can only backfire on him.

People who feel the correct verdict was reached might nevertheless conclude that Jackson is pushing his luck. He should allow public fury to burn itself out and desist from fuelling it. Whatever blaze will emerge from his attempts to douse the flames with the petrol of libel threats it shall not be a blaze of glory.

Jackson will have ample opportunity to discuss the experience, once his hearing in the Rugby world is out of the way. He will be able to debate as well as refute the charge made by Ó Ríordáin. What he should not do is clamp a legal muzzle over the mouth of genuine public concern. It will find a way to get out and thwart attempts by the Paddy protectors to police the Paddy defamers.

Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.
Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre      

Trebel Whammy

Today is Easter Monday, one of the key dates in the Christian calendar and it also marks the official start of the 2018 Protestant Marching Season. In his latest Fearless Flying Column, contentious commentator Dr John Coulter, maintains it is the Christian Churches - not the Loyal Orders - who should be concerned about society’s tragic secular drift.
And we’re off! Easter Monday sounds the starting gun for this year’s marching season and in spite of the Stormont stalemate, hopefully the signs are accurate in that Northern Ireland can look forward to a quiet parades period, especially over the traditional Twelfth.

As a senior journalist with the News Letter in the 1980s, the Easter holidays meant me covering parades by the Junior Orange Order and Royal Black Institution. But as I chalk up 40 years in journalism this year, I firmly believe it is the Christian Churches who need to be nervous about the Easter period.

Behind the scenes negotiations have borne fruit between the Loyal Orders and nationalist residents’ groups concerning contentious parades, so 2018 has the potential to be - yet again - one of the quietest marching seasons, provided people retain cool heads.

With some Northern Ireland political parties championing the cause of a shadow Assembly at Stormont until full blown devolution is returned to the Province, the sabre rattlers among us must be wondering what new laws the Westminster Government could impose on Ulster under the banner of Direct Rule.

As far as the Loyal Orders are concerned, could Westminster give even more powers to the Parades Commission not just to alter contentious parade routes, or impose tough rulings on parades, but also scrap certain parades altogether - and even recommend new parade routes or locations given the demographic changes which have taken place in many areas across Northern Ireland?

But Direct Rule could bring a treble whammy for the Christian Churches so that Easter services may be about prayers concerning the impact of certain laws which are sure to come down the legislative track at Northern Ireland.

Firstly, the use of the Petition of Concern at Stormont will not be able to be used to block the introduction of same-sex marriage in Northern Ireland. Westminster can pass legislation which will see marriage equality on the Northern Ireland statute books. The same situation will also apply to more liberal abortion legislation. Ironically, these two legal situations will be to the advantage of the DUP.

While the DUP holds a party position opposing both same-sex marriage and more liberal abortion legislation (unlike the Ulster Unionist Party which uses the individual conscience option with its elected representatives), the fact that Westminster will introduce such laws means that the DUP can blame the House of Commons when facing the electorate in future polls.

The majority of fundamentalist and evangelical Christians will adhere to Biblical values and will oppose both same-sex marriage and more liberal abortion laws, but it will be the votes in the House of Commons which will decide the implementation of such laws.

Could this seemingly secular drift in society have an impact on the selection of candidates - and election of councillors - in next year’s planned local government poll for the 11 super councils in Northern Ireland?

However, there is another piece of legislation which could have devastating consequences for the Christian community in Northern Ireland under Direction Rule - the introduction of more tougher defamation laws.

The defamation law in Northern Ireland and England diverged when Westminster passed the Defamation Act 2013 to reform the law. But the then Northern Ireland Executive at Stormont decided against adopting the new legislation automatically. Instead, a consultation took place which was completed in early 2015, but it is expected to be some time before the law is changed, especially since there has been no functioning Executive since January 2017.

Clearly, the current situation is that the reforms in the 2013 Act - which is operational in England and Wales - have no effect in Northern Ireland, and the Province continues to operate under the Defamation Act (Northern Ireland ) 1955 and the relevant parts of the Defamation Act 1996.

It would be logical to assume that as with same-sex marriage and liberal abortion laws, Direct Rule could mean the extension of the 2013 Act to Northern Ireland. This could have very serious consequences for what has become known in the Christian community as the ‘Judgemental Tubthumpers (JTs), or to use the common term, the church gossips.

The JTs should not be confused with preachers who make moral judgements based on Biblical verses. JTs, or church gossips, are people who point the accusing finger at people and openly criticise people without any legal or factual basis to support that criticism.

Should the 2013 Act become law in Northern Ireland, people on the receiving end of criticism from JTs could now be in a stronger legal position to begin court action against the JTs.

For many years, JTs got away with their often defamatory gossip about people because it was ‘not the done thing’ to take Christians to court. In practice, should the 2013 Act come on the Northern Ireland statute books, JTs will be forced to think very carefully about the legal evidence they have before they start to publicly criticise their fellow human beings.

Likewise, open air, or public, worship services could also come under the legislative hammer. Ever since the famous 1859 Revival, which saw many people in Ulster become ‘born again’ Christians, there has been a long history of the so-called street preachers in the Province.

Many of these street evangelists were dubbed ‘Hell fire preachers’ because they warned in their sermons about the Biblical consequences of not accepting Jesus Christ as Saviour (hence the term ‘saved’); that the ‘unsaved’ would spend eternity in Hell.

Given the growth of secularism in society and the increasing determination of militant atheists to ‘face down’ the Christian faith, the street evangelists could soon find themselves prosecuted under incitement laws.

Could a situation even emerge under the increasing so-called ‘snowflake society’, whereby people look for scenarios to be offended, that preachers in churches or meeting halls could find their sermons or Bible studies the subject of intense scrutiny and perhaps prosecution?


John Coulter is a unionist political commentator and former Blanket columnist. 

John Coulter is also author of ‘An Sais Glas: (The Green Sash): The Road to National Republicanism’, which is available on Amazon Kindle.
Follow John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoul

Standing With Her

Anthony McIntyre with more of his thoughts in the wake of the Belfast Rape Trial.


Yet it is hard to see how the jury could have reached any other verdict given the evidence placed before it. We are left with a legal fait accompli underwritten by the court determination that no rape took place in the bedroom of Paddy Jackson. The corollary of this is that there are no rapists and no rape victim.

For those of us who simultaneously and without contradiction are implacably opposed to both rape and trial without jury, the verdict of the jury is what must be stood with. Having long opposed both Diplock In Belfast and the Special Criminal Court in Dublin, it would be counterintuitive to abandon fidelity to jury trials in all circumstances outside of the accused electing to be tried by the judiciary.

In the Belfast rape trial there is nothing to show that evidence was withheld or suppressed. What evidence was available was placed before a jury who considered it for eight full weeks before reaching a swift verdict, the speed of which must again question both the probity and the prudence of the PSNI and PPS. With a woeful absence of prescience they failed to glimpse what was so strikingly salient to a jury. So obvious that deliberation and delivery took such a short period of time.

In a highly charged atmosphere where consent is the buzzword the question must be asked who in the PSNI and PPS give their consent to this trial ever going ahead? In the prolonged quest for women’s rights they have given the advantage to the rapist by amplifying a reluctance-cum-fear to testify.

Many women have been enraged by, if not the trial, then the backdrop to it. Yet the rage has produced more heat than light when it comes to addressing Lenin’s core strategic question: What Is To Be Done? Those taking to the streets to “stand with her” are not hitting the target. Protesting that the law is not fit for purpose blurs the focus. Making it even more unfit to the point that the accused is wholly at the mercy of the accuser, flies in the face of justice and equality before the law.

A raised awareness about consent would hardly have helped in the court case although it might have ensured there was never a case to be brought before the courts. Once in court it becomes the word of the accuser against the word of the accused. Calls for change in the law should be tempered with a uncompromising refusal to shift the onus of proof onto the accused: that they must prove their innocence rather than have their guilt proven. There can be no equivalent of Sharia Law in reverse where the word of the woman in such cases should weigh more than the word of the man. The anti-Sharia law campaign in the UK demanding one law for all can be instructive here.

Arguably, what needs changed is not the law but the societal matrix in which the law is enmeshed which gives rise to a broad assumption that a woman’s body is not her own. It does not suffice to maintain that this is a result of lad culture. The refusal to recognise autonomy over their own bodies is also to be found in the abortion debate with many still opposed to women making decisions; that somebody else can make choices for them regarding their bodies. Fruit for the monkey at the rapist's table where the sense of entitlement can only be enhanced by a culture that seeks to limit the application of consent: Hey sure, the law holds that her body is not really her own so I can have a piece of it too for a while.

Whatever we stand for or whoever we stand with, we should not be sitting down in the face of any sense of entitlement to make choices for women.


Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.
Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre      

Vatican Tribunal Convicts Guam Archbishop

Lena M writing in Atheist Republic probes the scandal ridden Catholic Church in Guam.

Photo Credits: The Catholic SunGuam Archbishop, Anthony Apuron, who was accused of sexually abusing young men, has been found guilty of some of the charges against him by a Vatican tribunal. Apuron was then removed from office and exiled from the island, meanwhile he retains the right to an appeal. This verdict was announced by the five-judge apostolic tribunal of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, but the verdict did not specify which allegations the archbishop has been found guilty of.

Apuron, a 72-years old archbishop who led the island's diocese since 1986, strongly denied the charges and said he was a victim of a "calumny" campaign but the verdict now says otherwise. "While I am relieved that the tribunal dismissed the majority of the accusations against me, I have appealed the verdict," said a statement from Apuron distributed by his Guam attorney, "God is my witness; I am innocent and I look forward to proving my innocence in the appeals process."

Pope Francis named a temporary administrator for Guam in 2016 after Apuron was accused by former altar boys of sexually abusing them when he was a priest. After that dozens of cases of child sexual abuse involving other priests on the island have come to light and the tiny island in the Pacific has been rocked by mounting allegations of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church there. The most recent charge emerged in January 2018, when Apuron’s own nephew accused the cleric of raping him in the chancery bathroom in or around 1989 or 1990 — when Apuron was already an archbishop. The archbishop was not criminally charged by civil authorities in Guam because the statute of limitations has expired.

In the past, when an elderly priest was convicted by the Vatican of sexual abuse they were often removed from ministry and sentenced to a lifetime of "penance and prayer.” But several high-ranking members of the Vatican clergy have long lobbied for more lenient sentences. In Apuron's case no restrictions on his ministry as a priest were announced and he greeted Pope Francis at the pope's February 7 general audience. Apuron is one of the highest-ranking churchmen to be convicted by a Vatican tribunal, and his rank as archbishop may have played a role in his sentence. Kurt Martens, professor of canon law at Catholic University of America in Washington, noted that Apuron would still remain a bishop, theologically speaking, because he was not defrocked by the verdict.

Meanwhile, the attorney for the victims said he was overjoyed with the fact that Apuron was found guilty. "We're ecstatic. It's a justified verdict," said David Lujan. Archbishop Michael Byrnes issued a statement also praising the decision. "It is a monumental marker in our journey toward healing as one Church, one people in God. I pray that all people would embrace this call for healing," said Byrnes, a former auxiliary bishop of Detroit who is primed to replace Apuron in the diocese if the conviction holds.


Follow Atheist Republic on Twitter @AtheistRepublic

Pubic Interest

Anthony McIntyre feels the PSNI and Public Prosecution Service have some explaining to do for ever having initiated the Belfast Rape Trial.
With the Belfast Rape Trial having reached a very definitive conclusion, the verdict has acted as an irritant rather than a balm.  The polarising effect has left a chasm. People took their sides early and vociferously. Online commentary seemed to veer between Rugby Rapists' Foul Play to Porn Star in Rugby Trial. Prejudice was the occasion for venom: reason trumped by rabidity. 


People, ostensibly free to believe whatever they want, are not obliged to share the opinion of the jury, and many have dissented from it, by proclaiming I stand with her, an endorsement of the position of the young woman whose evidence the jury rejected. From what I gleaned from the trial the jury reached the only safe verdict. That doses not mean that the young woman was lying but that her testimony was insufficient to reach the threshold for conviction. 
It is impossible for me to say with any degree of certainty who was telling the truth but as a firm believer in trial by jury as a bulwark against judicial arbitrariness and state usurpation of societal and individual rights, I can find no compelling reason to dissent from the jury’s verdict.  Little point in demanding trial by jury only to howl when the verdict is not what we might have preferred. I had no preference other than the returning of a correct verdict.
The real perpetrator in this case was the combined forces of the Police Service of Northern Ireland and the Public Prosecution Service, who between them in terms of assessing what was possible seem not to have 'a sixpence of an idea to fumble for'. How this case ever came to trial remains a mystery. I commented to my wife and others during court proceedings that there was not an altar boy’s chance in a priest's house of the Prosecution getting this one across the line. The evidence was simply not there in sufficient quantity to merit a conviction. Yet for their own institutional gratification, the PSNI and PPS persisted on their dash down the glory trail hoping that the windfall from a celebrity circus would fall on them. It has, right on top of their dunder heads. Not only did they put four young men in a dock which the quartet would as surely walk away from vindicated, they also failed in their care to the young woman they put in the witness box for eight days of gruelling cross examination. She did her best. They did not.
There was no public interest that merited this prosecution. Public interest in following a case and 'the public interest' are not synonymous concepts. The pubic is invariably a magnet for the public, and here it was no different. The Trials and Titillation of scandal.

The public interest has to be the protection of women from rape in all circumstances. Rape convictions are hard enough to secure without setting another rape trial up to fail. Whether the young woman at the centre of the Belfast Rape trial was a rape victim or not we cannot be certain in a way that we can about the existence of  many rape victims out there who will never set foot in a court as a result of this trial. The celebrity nature of the trail coupled with the insufficient weight of the Prosecution evidence had 'Destination Failure' stamped all over it. Daunting and deterring enough for a rape victim to endure even a successful trial, the experience must be grossly amplified when the outcome is acquittal.  
The PSNI and PPS between them, swaggered into court with eyes wide shut. Big hat no cattle. 




Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.
Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre      

Radio Free Eireann Broadcasting 31 March 2018

Martin Galvin with details of this weekend's broadcast from Radio Free Eireann.

RFE will have a live report by Ger Deveraux in Belfast about the Saoradh Republican Easter Commemoration at the International Wall in Belfast.

Belfast born Suffolk Long Island County Legislator now a Democratic candidate for Congress, Kate Browning, will preview her speech at the upcoming Easter Commemoration near the Thomas Clarke Monument, where the 1916 patriot leader lived before returning to organize and lead the Easter Rising. She will also preview upcoming commemorations at the Cohalan and Nassau County Courthouses and tell us about how she came to be running for Congress.

We will have major announcements about measures introduced this week in the New York State Senate and Assembly honoring the centennial of Ireland's 1918 Vote for Freedom which gave a democratic mandate to the Easter Rising and Proclamation as well as announcements about other Easter Commemorations.
John McDonagh and Martin Galvin co- host.

Radio Free Eireann is heard Saturdays at 12 Noon New York time on wbai 99.5 FM and wbai.org.

It can be heard at wbai.org in Ireland from 5pm to 6pm or anytime after the program concludes on wbai.org/archives.

SF Mary Lou McDonald - Pro Abortion On Demand

Helen McClafferty dismisses Mary Lou McDonald's support for abortion.
(That's a 3 months + 1 week old baby).

Not all Sinn Féin representatives will be happy with the move but Mrs McDonald insists she has a "duty to lead on this". And despite being a practising Catholic, who has raised her three children in the Catholic faith, the Sinn Féin leader says she can reconcile her religious beliefs and her efforts to modernise Ireland's abortion laws "with great ease".

How generous of her.


What Ms. McDonald deliberately fails to acknowledge is that being pro-life is not a question of religion, it's a question of human right's of the unborn child. Ms. McDonald and SF are trying to put a spin on the reasons the 8th should be repealed by making it about religion and in particular about being "Catholic".

How is she any different from those in the British government who proclaimed to the media the 'Troubles' were based on nothing more than a religious divide between Catholics and Protestants?

The 8th Amendment already protects the life of the mother when in danger during pregnancy. However, that's not good enough for Ms. McDonald. She wants abortion on demand and is willing to suspend and/or terminate any of her fellow SF party members who speak out against abortion or dare to vote their conscience.

Regardless of religious affiliation, or none at all, this issue should transcend Sinn Fein's toxic identity politics when it comes to abortion on demand.

Repeal of the 8TH should be recognized for what it is. The taking of an unborn baby's life up to 3 months old, on demand, even if the mother's life is not in any danger. That is total disregard for the child's right to life and is simply just plain murder.