This week and next, Anti-War Ireland will host a series of events aimed at re-focusing attention on the continuing use of Shannon Airport as an important logistical stop by one of the world’s most dangerous and vicious military machines.

The campaign to demilitarise Shannon airport received a boost in July this year with the unanimous acquittal in Dublin's Four Courts of the five Pitstop Ploughshares activists (Deirdre Clancy, Nuin Dunlop, Karen Fallon, Damien Moran and Ciaron O'Reilly). It was a remarkable outcome to a lengthy legal process that began with their decommissioning of a US warplane in Shannon back in February 2003, and it highlighted the extent of anti-war sentiment in this country.

On Saturday, 28 October, anti-war activists are returning to Shannon with flowers and banners to hold a mock-funeral from the town centre to the airport in memory of the dead of Iraq, Afghanistan and the United States. Among those attending this first major protest at Shannon this year will be two of the acquitted Ploughshares – Deirdre Clancy and Ciaron O'Reilly – and three members of Iraq Veterans Against War – Joshua Casteel, Stephen Lewis and Tony Lagouranis – all former US interrogators at the infamous Abu-Ghraib prison in Baghdad. The US military veterans will also address a series of Anti-War Ireland public meetings around the country.

More info: Former Abu-Ghraib interrogators speak in Dublin | Maynooth meeting on Friday with US Iraq War vets | Shannon demonstration on Saturday | Cork bus to Shannon demo | Dublin bus to Shannon demo | Galway bus to Shannon demo | Cork meeting with Abu-Ghraib vets next Tuesday | Belfast meeting with Abu-Ghraib vets next Wednesday

Raytheon's own 'how to find us'

In an indymedia.ie exclusive 'preview', veteran civil rights activist and journalist Eamonn McCann, publishes here the piece submitted to the Derry Journal for his weekly column this coming Tuesday. The story has huge ramifications for the future of democracy at local government level, as well as the global struggle against the US military industrial complex. This is why McCann, a member of the Socialist Workers Party and one of the "Raytheon 9", has asked for this article to be 'scattered far and wide'.

When did Raytheon give Derry City Council assurances that the company’s Derry plant would not engage in arms-related production?

In statements last week, representatives of the SDLP and Sinn Fein referred to the assurances and complained that Raytheon has reneged on them.

The statements followed a meeting on Monday between representatives of Raytheon and the leaders of the council parties. At this meeting, it seems, Raytheon admitted that the plant at Springtown was engaged in the manufacture of software for military systems. That is, the company apparently confessed to having acted in bad faith.

From CIA analysts to critics of US Middle East policy

In the week running up to the Shannon demonstration, Kathleen and Bill Christison, formerly senior analysts with the CIA and highly respected scourges of the present U.S. regime, will visit Ireland for the first time, on their way back from a fortnight in Israel-Palestine. In public talks around the country from October 21st-29th, they will give an informed update on the situation in Palestine, discuss what Kathleen has called “the coming collapse of Zionism", and offer an expert view on U.S. support for Israel, and indeed on the U.S.’s own imperial adventures

"Those who continue to support Israel, who make excuses for it as it descends into corruption, have lost their moral compass." - Kathleen Christison

In the following article from the newswire, a member of the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign analyses the insights of these two experts into the situation in Israel-Palestine.

Voices for Creative Non-Violence (VCNV.org) - a team that includes Farah Mokhtareizadeh (USA), Caoimhe Butterly (IRL), Michael Birmingham (IRL) and Kathy Kelly (USA),

Hi friends: I am sending these pictures to you in hopes you will perhaps be able to send them off to others. I have diligently been working on writing up reports on all of the places we have visited in the last few days, but for now the captions to these photos will have to do.... Part One   Part Two   Part Three   to be continued...

Highway to hell?

The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) won a small but significant victory in the international struggle against Connex and the illegal Israeli tramline being built by them on occupied Palestinian territory.

Connex (who in Ireland now operate under the name Veolia) also run the “Luas”, Dublin’s light-rail system. The Luas has only been running for a few years and it is likely that the tramline currently being built by Connex in occupied East Jerusalem is a near identical system. For this reason, representatives from Israel had been in negotiations with Veolia Ireland to have Israeli engineers and drivers trained on the Dublin Luas, with a view to then operating the illegal tramline in Jerusalem. The training was due to begin next month, and a contract was being finalised.

But in recent days, Veolia has been forced to cancel the proposed deal with its Israeli counterpart following pressure from Irish trade union representatives, in turn responding to overtures from the IPSC.