The Department of Justice says there are no plans to offer Aosdána member and peace activist Margaretta D’Arcy (79) early release from prison on compassionate grounds.
Former UN assistant secretary general Denis Halliday has appealed to Minister for Justice Alan Shatter, as have a number of MEPs and several TDs, but the department reiterated yesterday that Mr Shatter believed resolution of the matter "rests entirely with the individual concerned", as stated in the Dáil.
Outrage
Mr Halliday, who is opposed to the use of Shannon by the US military, said he hopes "Irish outrage will emerge" and that Mr Shatter will "release this extraordinary 79-year-old Margaretta who has been an ally in non-violence of President Michael D Higgins for many years".
D’Arcy is entering her third week in Limerick Prison. She was given a three-month sentence for refusing to sign a bail bond to uphold the law and keep away from unauthorised zones at the airport, following imposition of a suspended sentence for illegal incursion of the runway at Shannon on October 7th, 2012.
She is suffering from cancer and has arthritis, but her son Finn Arden said yesterday she was in "good spirits".
Mr Halliday said previous court cases involving protestors who had demonstrated over the US military use of Shannon had "recognised that individual citizens of any country had international duties that transcended national domestic obligations of obedience to local law when that local law violated provisions of international law".
Behind bars with the
Shannon One: Weekend
