THE Green MEP, Ms Patricia McKenna, is seeking assurances from the Government that Ireland will "in no way assist NATO's illegal air strikes against the Serbs".
"Ireland must follow the example of neutral Austria and close its airspace to NATO war planes," she said. She also queried whether US bombers flew through Irish airspace on their way to Yugoslavia.
Ms McKenna made her comments in a statement issued to coincide with a `No to the War Campaign' press conference in Dublin yesterday.
Mr Kevin Wingfield, for the campaign, said the NATO intervention in Yugoslavia was about promoting Western strategic interests rather than any humanitarian considerations. The bombings had made things worse in the region leading to a consolidation of the people of Yugoslavia behind President Slobodan Milosevic while making the situation of the Albanian majority in Kosovo much worse.
Settlement in the region was a matter for the peoples of the region, he said, it was not for the West to impose a solution. He believed that would follow when a democratic opposition emerged in Yugoslavia, but this was being stymied by economic sanctions.
Mr Richard Boyd Barrett, of the Socialist Workers Party, said he rejected outright the claims of the West and NATO that they were pursuing humanitarian interests in Yugoslavia.
He believed US intervention there was about furthering its strategic interest in what was really a conflict of the great powers. He felt it was about curbing Russian influence in the region.
Mr Thomas Frayn, who was visiting a pen pal in Belgrade when the bombing began last Wednesday, recalled how they had been attending a barbecue on a balcony when the first bombs fell at 8 p.m. He said the most noticeable reaction of people in Belgrade to the bombings was anti-US feeling.
The "No to the War Campaign" will hold a "mass emergency protest picket" outside the US embassy in Dublin at 6 p.m. today. Protest marches will take place in Dublin, Cork, and Belfast on Thursday, in Galway tomorrow and Waterford on Saturday. Further protests are planned for Derry, Limerick and Tralee.
