THE Minister for Defence and the Marine favours Ireland joining the Partnership for Peace, the NATO linked association for non aligned countries, writes Lorna Siggins. Mr Barrett said yesterday he was satisfied it would have no implications for neutrality and Ireland was not obliged to take part in missions that did not comply with our neutral stance.
Non aligned countries such as Finland, Sweden, Austria and Switzerland had joined and Ireland's involvement could be confined to peacekeeping and humanitarian missions. Only "micro" states such as the Holy See, Andorra, San Marino, Liechtenstein and Cyprus, and the three states of former Yugoslavia, had not joined. The Minister, who had been due to refer to this in his speech to the RACO conference in Galway this week, said the decision to, join the PEP must be approved by both Houses of the, Oireachtas. Mr Barrett did not attend the RACO conference because, he said, he was unable to find a pairing for the confidence vote in the Government.
Recently the Tanaiste, Mr Spring, had indicated that membership might not require a referendum.