The Green Party has called on the Government to cancel the visit later this month of US president George Bush.
Claiming that Mr Bush will use the visit to boost Irish-American support for his re-election, the party's outgoing MEP in Dublin, Ms Patricia McKenna, said that Ireland should not be used as a "scenic backdrop" for his campaign.
Ms McKenna also called for an independent and public investigation into war crimes in Iraq. "By cancelling the summit, the EU should be conveying the message that accountability for the systematic abuses and tortures carried out by US forces in Iraq must include the highest levels of the US administration," she said.
The Greens plan a poster campaign with the motto "Give Bush the Push" before the visit.
Green TD Mr John Gormley said the White House had signalled in March that the agenda for the summit would include broadening EU-US co-operation on Iraq. He said "nearly 36,000 US troops" had gone through Shannon airport in the first three months of this year and he did not want to see "this co-operation broadened".
