The European Court of Human Rights today held preliminary hearings on the case of an Irish woman claiming her human rights were violated when she was forced to travel to Britain for an abortion.

"The woman who has not been identified but is being called 'D' became pregnant with twins. One of these died in the womb and second was found to suffer abnormalities. D decided to have an abortion, but since Irish women are not entitled to have an abortion unless there is a serious threat to their lives, she was forced to travel to Britain. D claims that her inability to obtain an abortion in the Republic of Ireland was a breach of her human rights. The complaint is being made under two articles of the human rights convention: Article 3, that nobody be subjected to torture, in humane or degrading treatment or punishment, and Article 8, the right to respect for private and family life and of no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right.

The case could potentially result in Ireland's constitutional ban on abortion being challenged by a panel of European judges. If the court were to find in favour of D in this case, it could mean the Irish government would be forced to extend the right to abortion to women whose foetuses were found to be abnormal. The case has been brought directly to Strasbourg court, and has never been before the Irish courts, the usual approach before going to Europe. It could take a year or more for a hearing and there is a possibility the case might not be found admissible."

Some coverage on the topic from the good folk on IMC Ireland:

Back street abortions illustrate need for free, safe and legal abortion services in Ireland | Alliance For Choice condemns Bush's 'War on Women'! | Restrictive Abortion Information Legislation Jeopardises Women's Health | Day Of Action Against The Information Act | Pro Life Campaign considering legal action against Midland Health Board | Interview on the legacy of the X-case | Do You Remeber the Last Time? The Abortion Referendum of 2002 | Yes, It was No..

At the GPO: 'Pro-Lifers' Petition to *keep* Abortion Illegal 0.06 Mb

My meeting with Howard Guille did however highlight how much the last 30 years have consisted on an attack on the common good. If proof of this are needed one has only to look at the disaster of Katrina and New Orleans. The media got into town three days before the hurricane struck. Yet after four days of disaster, help had still not arrived to the beleaguered victims who have been forced to hunker down amid dead bodies and their own excrement by the Bush government.

Never since the Irish Famine of 1846-8 has the logic of the market been so starkly revealed. Millions died in Ireland, not because of the lack of food but because the British government wanted the land of the Irish peasantry to rear their sheep and cattle on. See an an account of how the likes of Nassau Senior, economic adviser to the British Govt, thought that a million deaths from the famine "would scarcely be enough to do much good". In the end he got his million and many more.

The crime of the Irish peasantry was to be poor and in the way of Capital’s plans. Similarly the crime of Afro-Americans is to be poor and in the way of Capital’s plans. In New Orleans the poor who are mainly blacks were abandoned in the city. They did not have the cars to take them to safety. The authorities provided no means to get them out of the city. They were herded to the Superdome and left to rot without medications, clothing, water or food. The mayor it seems was worried they might graffiti the dome, but he didn’t worry about them starving.

Indymedia Ireland also supplies Pay check heads, semantics , survival hints and other analysis. Elsewhere the city of Lestat the vampire and the baton rouge has got its IMC together

Why is it that Irish governments are addicted to importing ideas long recognised as abject failures - even in the countries in which they originate?

For the last 20 years, for instance, US authorities and industries have been abandoning the use of incinerators as a form of waste management because of the severity of the health and environmental damage they most definitely cause. Local populations in the US have defeated more than 300 incinerator proposals and the industry is now virtually extinct there. About 500 have been shut down in Japan – a country that has traditionally been heavily reliant on incineration. In Europe, according to a report by the Global Anti Incinerator Alliance, the emphasis has been on using alternative waste management techniques which in the most successful cases have resulted in an actual reduction in the amount of waste needing disposal – despite growing populations.

But Paddy is always anxious to make a big fool of himself. During that same period in Ireland, naturally, we have built commercial and other incinerators around our small country as if they were going out of style – which of course they are - and in spite of ferocious opposition to them from virtually every community in which they have been sited. In a country this size and in the context of all that is known about their dangers this is – or should be – a matter of national outrage. Nevertheless, our government is again (greetings to the 5) smirking, flirting and generally prostituting itself to another rapacious industry by facilitating a deal that will surely injure health and kill many people in this country if it is allowed to go ahead. As with the Dutch and Norwegian oil companies in Mayo (Shell and Statoil), Indaver in Belgium must not be able to believe their luck. No other European country is allowing them to do as they are doing in Ireland.

A visit to Ireland by two leaders of the San Jose de Apartado Peace Community from Western Colombia ended on Tuesday night August 9th. As Jesus Emillio Tuberquia and Maria Brigida Gonzalez left from Dublin Airport they were satisfied that their six days in Ireland had been productive.

According to one of the speakers, Jesus Emillio:
"The Colombian Government is going around the world talking about peace, while it is supporting the intimidation and massacre of our community leaders. It is vital that the Irish Government is aware that the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe's much-acclaimed demobilisation of right-wing Paramilitary Groups is a SHAM. It amounts to nothing more than the legalisation such groups and the legitimisation of the terror, which they have inflicted on the Colombian civilian population over the years. A terror which they continue to inflict, in clear collaboration and co-operation with the Colombian Army, despite their supposed demobilisation. A collaboration, which is no great, surprise given President Uribe himself actually started up the right-wing paramilitaries."

Elsewhere on the newswire:

Colombia Solidarity Network describe how "One month has elapsed since the murder of the leader of the Committee for Social Integration of Catatumbo (CISCA), JOSÉ TRINIDAD TORRES MUÑOZ carried out by members of the FARC [allegedly - IMC Editor]. Up till now the FARC haven't given any explanation to the communities of the region..." ...continues here.

IMC IRL Stories Mentioning Colombia | ZNet Watch On Colombia | View All Counter Punch Articles On Colombia | Website Of Comunidad de Paz | Peace In Colombia | Latin America Solidarity Centre Ireland

Welcome to the Ireland of the 21st century. A country where ordinary folks are locked up in prison for deciding to stand up against a multinational corporation hell bent on exploiting both people and finite resources for their own personal gain. The fact that Micheál Ó Seighin, Willie Corduff, Brendan Philbin, Vincent McGrath, and Philip McGrath are still in prison suggests very clearly that our justice system and our ‘leaders’ are much more interested in maintaining close friendships with multinational business criminals, than they are in ensuring that justice, equality and sustainability are central and practical values at the core of society.

In Ireland like much of the western developed world, we’ve almost become so cynical and tired of our political ‘leaders’ that we hardly bat an eyelid about the gombeen politics of corruption, about the stealing of the wealth we all help create and of the resources we all share. But the courage and conviction of the Rossport five, their families and supporters suggest that people are not afraid to take back democracy and put it where it belongs, with the people.

The Soundmigration Files