Thousands take to the streets of Dublin to protest against water charges The protest is expected to attract thousands of people.
Source: sam boal/Photocall Ireland
Aggregate from Irish Blog as 80,000 to 100,000 march for their birthright of free water.
THOUSANDS OF PROTESTERS took to the the streets of Dublin today to protest against the water charges.
Before the demonstration began, organisers said they expected upwards of 10,000 people, however, they now estimate that 80,000 to 100,000 people took part.
The gardaí as usual would not confirm the numbers of today’s protest, stating that they would not be making an estimate.
They said that the demonstration today has been peaceful with no reports of any arrests.
The march, which started at the Garden of Remembrance earlier, took protesters down O’Connell Street to the Dáil, before turning back and settling at the GPO to hear speeches.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie, South Dublin County Councillor Gino Kenny said that he had not seen such a large crowd at a protest since 2003 when people marched against the war in Iraq.
“The atmosphere great today, so many people have taken part from all over the country. This is just the start of a much larger campaign. We mustn’t lose momentum, this is when people need to stand together,” he said, adding that the numbers that turned up today are an indication that the “government are in big trouble”.
Source: Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland
There are significant delays in the city centre this afternoon.
Water and sanitation are a human right! Water is a public good, not a commodity. We invite the European Commission to propose legislation implementing the human right to water and sanitation as recognised by the United Nations, and promoting the provision of water and sanitation as essential public services for all. The EU legislation should require governments to ensure and to provide all citizens with sufficient and clean drinking water and sanitation. We urge that: The EU institutions and Member States be obliged to ensure that all inhabitants enjoy the right to water and sanitation.
Water supply and management of water resources not be subject to ‘internal market rules’ and that water services are excluded from liberalisation. The EU increases its efforts to achieve universal access to water and sanitation. News, IRISH, MARCH, PHUKIN, WATER, Dublin, Irish Water, #right2water, Ireland, Irish Blog
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Deputy First Minister of British Occupied Ireland, Martin McGuinness, says the sectarian paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) are the real orgnizers of a loyalist protest march planned in Belfast city centre this coming Saturday.
Questioned in Stormont boasted to be aProtestant parliament for a Protestant people, Mr McGuinness said "I don't have any doubt as to who's organising this parade, this parade is being organised by the UVF and it is being supported by elements within the Orange Order," he said.
The protest will also highlight the other issues that are impacting on working class Protestant communities, including increasing poverty”Billy Hutchinson Progressive Unionist Party leader,
He said the media were being "exercised"(conned), over who was really organising the march. McGuinness told the assembly on Tuesday, that there was a duty to face up to the concerns being expressed by Belfast's business community, about the potential economic damage that could be caused by further protests.
Loyalists plan to mark the first anniversary of the flags protest, with a demonstration at Belfast's City Hall on 30 November.The march is being held just before the first anniversary of Belfast council's decision, to restrict flying of the union flag to designated days. Following the decision, there has been regular protests and riots in the city and throughout British Occupied Ireland all year long. A car bomb in Belfast this week marks a return to war in Belfast.
UVF Bomb Factory Raises Fears of a New Offensive; MASSIVE FIRE EXTINGUISHER... Newspaper article from: Sunday Mirror (London, England) ...CASSIDY and DONNA CARTON THE RUC believes a UVF bomb factory uncovered last weekend in a...last year's loyalist feud between the UVF and UDA. They said forensic tests showed...that 1,000 Ecstasy tablets belonged the UVF - a major embarrassment to David Ervine...
Empire of UVF Evil Spreads Tentacles across Scotland as Drugs and Pubs Fuel... Newspaper article from: Daily Record (Glasgow, Scotland) ...Edinburgh. Violent crooks linked to the UVF have tried to take over the capital's drug trade. Two senior UVF figures travelled to Edinburgh recently to inspect the new operation. For years, the UVF has used pubs in Glasgow, Ayrshire and...
What Bloody Sparked the UVF/LVF Feud; AS LOYALIST PARAMILITARY GROUPS END... Newspaper article from: Sunday Mirror (London, England) ...new edition of their best selling book "UVF", Henry McDonald and Jim Cusak give a...1999.THE first feud between the LVF and UVF began, for real, on December 27, 1999...to live. Around a dozen members of the UVF, some armed with pick axe handles and clubs...
NO Recruitment NO Training NO Targeting .. SO WHY Keep Guns? UVF STANDS DOWN... Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) ...By MAURICE FITZMAURICE and DAN McGINN THEUVF was under pressure last night to co-operate...their weapons. The announcement that the UVF is to stand down was welcomed by both Prime...founded the modern, outlawed version of the UVF in 1966, set out the organisation's new...
UVF ARE TRYING TO BUY NEW GUNS; Shock Revelation as IMC Prepares to Shut Down Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) Byline: MAURICE FITZMAURICE UVF members have talked about buying new weapons...Irish governments after six years. The UVF was among the main terror groups to announce...the IMC yesterday repeated its belief that UVF leaders earlier this year sanctioned the...
UVF 'PUSHED FOR PEACE' BEFORE TERROR OF TROUBLES; Loyalist Group Was Branded... Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) Byline: MAURICE FITZMAURICE THE UVF tried to start a peace process in the early...the work of leading thinkers within the UVF and Red Hand Commando - better known for...years which involved speaking to former UVF and RHC members as well as reading loyalist...
UVF Had Gun Talks in Dublin Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) ...can reveal. Sources in Dublin confirmed UVF and Red Hand Commando representatives held...meetings took place 24 hours before the UVF and Red Hand Commando membership became...de Chastalain's decommissioning body. UVF sources in Belfast yesterday said the visit...
UVF Plot a 'Reaction' to Republicans; Ervine Insists Loyalist Terror Group Is... Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) ...leader David Ervine yesterday claimed the UVF bid to ship explosives to Northern Ireland...conspiring to further the purposes of the UVF by transporting five kilos of explosives...Belfast. Prosecutor Murdo MacLeod said the UVF had a network of cells and support groups...
Killed Because He Stood Up to the UVF Bullies; My Son Was Murdered. It Was... Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) ...buried today after his life was cut short by the UVF - all because he came out on top in a fight with...beating up the local commanding officer of the UVF. The unofficial police confirmation of the UVF role in the killing has again raised doubts about...
I Was Set-Up Claims UVF Commander; 'Murder Gang' Leader in Secret Meeting Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) A NORTH Belfast UVF commander who is being fingered for being...Newtownabbey, told them he believed the UVF leadership on the Shankill Road has sought...exact revenge for the murder of alleged UVF leader Richard Jameson. But, at a secret...
UVF 'Deactivates' and Agrees to Put Weapons 'Beyond Reach' ; HOME Newspaper article from: The Independent (London, England) ...loyalist icon Augustus "Gusty" Spence, theUVF promised to end violent and criminal activity...least because of recent indications that the UVF was involved in intelligence-gathering...other loyalist groups. The most recent UVF murder was the killing of Michael Green...
Uvf Wreath `an Insult to Hillsborough Dead' in a Week of Shame for Ulster... Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) ...Hillsborough disaster last night attacked the UVF for laying a paramilitary wreath at the...artificial poppies was left last week by the UVF at the pillar of remembrance outside Anfield...April 15 1989. The wreath, which read "UVF for God and Ulster", was left by A Company...
UVF Report Delivered to Hain Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) A REPORT on the state of the UVF&s ceasefire was handed over to the British...report on the increasing activities of the UVF on top of his in-tray. In recent weeks...expect Mr Hain to immediately specify the UVF ceasefire was over. In reality this no...
A MAN OF WAR ..BUT ALSO A MAN OF PEACE; Former UVF Chief & Loyalist Political... Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) ...father who was a member of the original UVF. Spence reformed the paramilitary organisation...The shooting was the first of a 40-year UVF killing spree which claimed the lives of...Mr Ward's murder while there he became UVF commander. While regarded for years as...
Internal Talks Could Lead to UVF Ceasefire Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) THE UVF is preparing to call a ceasefire in its war...announcement by the Secretary of State to say the UVF cessation was no longer recognised had been...clearing the way for the Government to act. The UVF has killed four people in the last two months...
ORANGE ORDER 'CLOAK' FOR MERSEY UVF TWO; Court Hears of Lodge Links as Judge... Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) ...used Orange lodges as a "cloak" to cover UVFactivities, a court heard yesterday. Roy...and two months, for being a member of the UVF and for nine offences linked to firearms...years after admitting membership of the UVF. Both are former members of the Territorial...
Abject Remorse - and More Killings; UVF CEASEFIRE Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) ON October 13, 1994, veteran UVF chief Gusty Spence announced a ceasefire on behalf of...convenience has often been regarded as a cover for the UVF's continued use of violence. The UVF has been implicated in a number of murders but, in the...
Dear UVF. Sorry about Killing All of Your Mates, but We'd like to Call A.... Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) ...humiliated by rival terror bosses in the UVF, The People can reveal. Loyalist sources...function in Lurgan and asked Portadown's new UVF leader to accept their offer of a truce...embarrassingly rejected out of hand, with the UVF chief saying: "Don't you think you boys...
LOYALIST NIGHT OF THE LONG KNIVES; Gusty Forced to Flee. Violence Spreads.... Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) ...warlords launched a devastating purge on UVFsupporters last night, as violence exploded...Ulster's Protestant heartland. Top ex-UVF man Gusty Spence was among those ejected...attack on the pub, a popular haunt among UVF supporters. Three more were hurt in a second...
UVF Sanctioned Moffett Murder - IMC Newspaper article from: The News Letter (Belfast, Northern Ireland) ...murder "was committed by members of the UVF acting as such" and that the perpetrators...We believe that the tension between the UVF and Mr Moffett and his family, and particularly...behaved in ways which, in the eyes of the UVF, appeared to disregard the standing of...
Uvf Party on Jack's Turf; Exclusive Newspaper article from: Sunday Mirror (London, England) ...fundraising night - in his own backyard. The UVFevent at Airdrie Town Hall, Lanarkshire...6-a-head to watch notorious Belfast UVF band Platoon belt out Loyalist tunes, under...watchful eye of a team of menacing bouncers. UVF supporters travelled from Ulster for the...
'MAFIA STYLE' UVF NO LONGER ON CEASEFIRE; Group Orchestrating Violence and... Newspaper article from: The Mirror (London, England) Byline: UNA MURPHY THE UVF is no longer on ceasefire, the chairman...mafia-like activities. He added: "The UVF have been engaged in murder, attempted...have called for the respecification of the UVF [stating its ceasefire is over]." Sinn...
PUP Row as UVF Oppose Agreement Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) ...PUP is finished, ex-supporters in the UVF say. Shadowy figures in the terror group...was 'greatly exagerrated.' One former UVF figure in Belfast had told us: "The truth...longer has the backing of a majority of the UVF." The source said the party was fatally...
INSIDE THE LOYALIST FEUD; UVF Blames Its Rivals for Series of Drug Murders Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) THE UVF last night flatly denied it had shed any blood...sworn enemies since Billy Wright split from the UVF and formed the mid-Ulster based LVF five...But that dispute escalated this year when UVF commander Richard Jameson was gunned down outside...
TEENAGERS BUTCHERED BY UVF DEATH SQUAD; Feud Leaves Youths with Throats Slit... Newspaper article from: The People (London, England) SICKENING UVF killers ferried two teenagers to an isolated...was high last night as it was claimed the UVF had left 'a recognised calling card' by...teenagers had their throats slashed. The UVF has been waiting to pick its moment for bloody..
I don’t think anyone has ever made a greater impression on me than Marian Price.
She and her late sister Dolours are, of course, iconic figures in the Irish freedom
struggle.
Indeed, there are probably no two women or men to match their heroism.
And, yet, it was not Marian’s heroic stature that so deeply moved me.
It was, rather, her gentleness, soft-spokeness and loveliness… That despite all the outrageous, vengeful, cruel and vicious treatment by the British-Northern Ireland Government, she remains a dignified, gracious and beautiful human being.
I visited Marian in her prison-hospital in Belfast on Friday, February22, 2013. Along with her attorney and husband, I spent ninety minutes with her.
I had gone back to Ireland for a family funeral. And the first thing Marian did was to express condolences to me.
There she was almost two years in prison, six months gravely ill a prison hospital, just trying to recover from the death of her beloved sister and she the takes time to comfort me !
The British-Northern Ireland Government is criminal in its treatment of Marian. Anyone in a position of power in Ireland – North or South – who has turned their back on Marian is criminally irresponsible.
Shame on them, and shame on former colleagues who have deserted her. This is on of the most shameless incidents in the sad history of the Irish struggle.
How can one have confidence in a government that treats Marian Price in such a vicious way? Is this what we were promised by the peace-process? Is this what the political Parties, North and South, are asking Irish-Americans to support?
As a result of her internment of 18 months, more than a year in isolation, SD torture and 6 months of force feeding, Marian Price is now suffering from both physically and psychologically. After further deterioration in recent moths, Marianis currently in the City Hospital Belfast. She suffers from a number of psychological conditions as well several physical ailments including severe arthritis, a suppressed immune system and repeated infections.Now to compound this she has fluid in one lung.So Let your voice be heard in Dublin Nov 3rd. Assembly @ Garden of Remembrance, 2.00 pm and march to the iconic steps of the GPO !
Dehumanizing Internment
The dehumanization of internees such as Marian Price, through the infliction of pain and torture, not only damages her body and mind, it is as Elaine Scarry wrote, world-destroying, "It is the intense pain that destroys a person‘s self and world, a destruction experienced spatially as either the contraction of the universe down to the immediate vicinity of the body or as the body swelling to fill the entire universe. Intense pain is also language destroying; as the content of one‘s world disintegrates, so the content of one‘s language disintegrates; as the self disintegrates, so that which would express and project the self is robbed of its source and its subject. Thus, physical erasure also eliminates the intelligible voice, reducing human speech to the primordial expression of pain, a state anterior to language."
In addition to these erasures of the body, mind and self, British torture achieves a third form of physical erasure, by the very fact
of the political prisoners‘ torture, requiring concealment. The retreat of torture from respectability by international standards, means that the British must perform it in hiding, primarily with censorship. However they also conceal their involvement in rendition, as they hide their activity in subcontracted assassination, with more curtains over their already, shrouded victim's bodies.
While their prolonged stress positions, as well as other conduct constituting cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment may not always rise to the level of torture, they nevertheless were found guilty of such, by the International Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg regarding their activity in Ireland. The physical erasure of British torture is self-evident, and therefore needs only brief comment.
In secret courts, with identity blacked out on their transcripts, judges will not countenance torture complaints, they will have none of this conduct, deeming it unacceptable and defendants will receive a final warning, oblivious to international law. In such courts they do not want to hear the words, such international law again. The British are not concerned about international law, they will insist on it, by having someone like Marian Price removed from the hearings, so that their secret services and military can consider classified evidence against her in secret.
If we accept the integrity of human rights law and its independence from any state sovereign, then it follows that there can never be
lawlessness such as there is in British Occupied Ireland, only gross violations of human rights law.British habeas-corpus-stripping provisions, are a core breach of human rights law, besides the many liberty concerns with regard to the Geneva Conventions. British attempts at unilateral re-interpretation of sections international law, have no constitutional rights whatsoever
British Occupied Ireland with the treatment of political internees such as Marian Price, Martin Corey and many others, has become a human-rights-free zone.The quarantine of many Irish political prisoners is a familiar concealment. When placed in a human rights context. British Occupied Ireland is often described in terms of the British government‘s denial of rights to political prisoners but equally important the denial of their Irish humanity.
British Occupied Ireland has been a laboratory, of their dehumanization, while they use their media, such as the BBC world srvice, to refer to prisoners of conscience, as terrorists, to ostracize them from what it means to be human and allow the British the physical and mental treatment of Irish political prisoners, abhorrent to human beings.Thus they accomplish through cultural erasure, through the creation of the terrorist narrative; legal erasure and physical erasure through torture.
While the dimensions of dehumanization are distinct, they are interrelated. All are connected by law and specifically by human rights.The British have created the preconditions for state power activity, so brutal, as to deprive Irish political prisoners of the ability to be human or have any human rights.They stand exposed to the violence of the British state, unmediated, unprotected by any human rights, reducing political internees to a state of bare life without humanity. What is evolving is the Irish have no right, to have rights, a vacuum enabling extreme British state violence, placing the internment of Marian Price, at the center of a struggle not just for rights, but for humanity that includes you and me.
Through resistance, political space will open but the mere resistance, the assertion of self against state violence, is self and life-affirming. Resistance is a way of staying human. This, then, is the work that rights do, when pushed to the brink of annihilation, they provide us with a rudimentary and perhaps inadequate tool to maintain our humanity. Thus by paying particular attention to the value of human rights and arguing the importance of rights, it becomes a mode of resistance, to state violence.
Irish political prisoners themselves, have a long track record of participating in direct forms of resistance in many forms, including dirt strikes and hunger strikes, as a form of prisoner resistance, with lawyer rights-based litigation and the hunger strikes, sharing an understanding of the relationship between rights, violence, and humanity. While sometimes the resistance of lawyers and of prisoners may not be enough to win the prisoners‘ freedom, it is still essential when British state violence is so extreme, as to attempt to extinguish our humanity.
Victimized
Demoralized
Brutalized
Dehumanized
Before the sickening images can take a political toll
The right-wing spin machine plays damage control
Let your voice be heard in Dublin Nov 3rd. Assembly @ Garden of Remembrance, 2.00 pm and march to the iconic steps of the GPO !
Monday October 29, 2012 16:36
by BrianClarkeNUJ - AllVoices
