NO CAMPAIGN:A PRO-PALESTINIAN activist campaigning against the Lisbon Treaty yesterday complained he had been arrested while erecting a poster near the Israeli embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin.
Sean Clinton, a Limerick businessman and member of Irish Friends of Palestine Against Lisbon (IFPAL), told a press conference that gardaí informed him the Israeli embassy had made a complaint that the poster was “offensive and abusive”. A spokesman for the embassy said no such complaint was made.
A spokeswoman for Dublin City Council confirmed that the council had requested Mr Clinton to remove a large version of the poster – reading “EU policy facilitates Israeli genocide” – from a traffic island near the embassy, as it posed a hazard to motorists.
Mr Clinton informed the council he would erect another, smaller poster. He was approached by gardaí while putting up the second sign. Following an argument, Mr Clinton said he was told he would be arrested if he did not leave the area. He was subsequently arrested and brought to Donnybrook Garda station, where he was later released without charge.
Mr Clinton claims there have been several instances of IFPAL posters being removed or vandalised throughout the country.
He appeared along with fellow IFPAL member Raymond Deane, and Kieran Allen of the Socialist Workers’ Party and Voteno.ie, at a press conference held to highlight the role of the EU’s common foreign and security policy (CFSP) in the debate on the Lisbon Treaty.
The IFPAL representatives argued that the CFSP, and EU trade deals with Israel, were “inimical to the human and political rights of the Palestinian people, and detrimental to Ireland’s good standing internationally”.
Mr Deane accused the Government of “sacrificing its traditionally pro-Palestinian policy in the interests of consensus with its EU partners”. In a statement, IFPAL said it believes it is time for “a dramatic change of direction in the EU, and that a No vote . . . could pave the way for such a change”.
Mr Allen argued Irish foreign policy was being “dictated” by the interests of larger member states. He criticised EU policy on Africa, claiming it was driven by the interests of former colonial powers such as France. The EU mission to Chad, to which Ireland contributed the second-largest number of troops, was, he said, an “extraordinary and naked example of 21st century imperialism”. Its real purpose was to “maintain the French-backed Chadian dictatorship”.