Call on Irish Human Rights Commision to resign

Failure to investigate use of Shannon for Torture and Iraq War

Please come to Shannon tomorrow 19 May 2007, or any other day of your choice, to protest against the human rights abuses being facilitated on a daily basis at Shannon airport.

In January 2006, I formally requested the Irish Human Rights Commission to investigate the use of Shannon airport for the purposes of facilitating the US Rendition for Torture programme and the transit of US troops to unlawful wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
On 17 May 2007, 17 months later, I received a reply from the IHRC saying that they had decided not to investigate any of the issues I had raised with then.
The IHRC has just decided that it "was not EXPEDIENT to investigate torture and for the abuse of Shannon airport to facilitate the US war against the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan.

I call on all the Human Rights Commissioners to resign from the Commission because of your failure to investigate the abuses of Shannon airport and Irish territory for the purposes of committing and facilitating gross human rights abuses.

Open letter by Edward Horgan to Mr Maurice Manning, Chairperson, Irish Human Rights Commission

Date: 18 May 2007
To: Mr Maurice Manning, Chairperson, Irish Human Rights Commission (IHRC)

Dear Mr Manning,
I have received the attached response from IHRC Assistant Caseworker, Gerry Finn to my request that the IHRC should investigate the rendition for torture programme operated by the US through Shannon airport and through other airports internationally. I find this response wholly inadequate and unacceptable. The IHRC has effectively decided in the interests of “expediency” not to investigate some of the most serious breaches of human rights in which the Irish state has been complicit or involved in since the foundation of the state.
I find it appalling the IHRC should decide that it was it was not “either necessary or expedient” to investigate:
‘the alleged involvement of the State in the facilitation of, and participation in, gross abuses of human rights in Iraq, including unlawful, extra-judicial killings of civilians’
or
‘the alleged involvement of the State in the facilitation of, and participation in, gross abuses of human rights in Iraq, including unlawful, extra-judicial killings of civilians’
or
‘the alleged abuse of the Irish judicial system against peace activists in County Clare’

I wish to point out that is should not have been necessary for the IHRC to receive a complaint from me or any other citizen in order for the IHRC to carry out an in-depth investigation into the misuse of Shannon airport for the purposes of human rights abuses. The IHRC should have initiated and carried out such investigations of its own volition. To decide that it was not “expedient” to carry out such investigations brings the very existence of the IHRC into question. The use of the word “expedient” in such a context is at best unfortunate. It can be argued that it is never “expedient” for anyone to investigate human rights abuses, because human rights investigators are often persecuted for investigating and exposing human rights abuses.
I pursued my complaint in the hope that the IHRC would seriously investigate the abuses that were being knowingly facilitated by the Irish Government to formally register the issues of these abuses of human rights. I did at least expect the IHRC to take some steps to “be seen to have investigated” the complaints that I made. I am deeply disappointed that the IHRC even failed to initiate such an investigation.
As a human rights activist, I am particularly incensed to be informed that the IHRC, that decided not to accede to my “request for an enquiry into ‘the alleged involvement of the State in the facilitation of, and participation in, gross abuses of human rights in Iraq, including unlawful, extra-judicial killings of civilians’ on the grounds that:
• The matter does not come within the jurisdiction of the State”
This statement in my opinion is wrong in fact and in law. My complaint referred specifically to the use of Shannon airport for the facilitation of the unlawful war in Iraq. I did not allege that the Irish Government sent troops to Iraq to kill Iraqi people as the US and the UK had done and continue to do. My complaint was, and is, that the Irish Government knowingly allowed and facilitated the US government in the killing of hundred’s of thousands of innocent people in Iraq. It is a matter of vicarious liability and complicity rather than direct involvement in the acts of killing and torturing innocent people. To state that “The matter does not come within the jurisdiction of the State” is to suggest, or admit the possibility, that Shannon airport is no longer “within the jurisdiction of the State”. It is also to deny the factual legal situation that anyone within the Irish state who conspires or facilitates the commission of crimes outside the jurisdiction is subject to the Irish criminal legal system.
The statement by the IHRC implies that the Omagh bombers who may have planned and facilitated the killing of innocent people in Omagh could not be prosecuted or investigated in the Irish Republic. There is no significant difference, apart from the distance in miles and the numbers of people killed, between paramilitary murders in Omagh and unlawful killings and torture associated with the Iraq War. There is no significant difference between those in the Irish Republic who stole and prepared the cars that were used in the Omagh bombings, and the actions of the Irish Government in allowing and facilitating to use Shannon airport for the killing over half a million people in Iraq.
The IHRC has failed to act even within its limited remit to even investigate the crimes facilitated by the Irish Government at Shannon airport.
Many Irish people are under the illusion that the Irish Human Rights Commission has the power and the inclination to protect human rights in Ireland, and to prevent others from using Irish territory for the purposes of committing gross abuses of human rights. The actions, or inactions, of the IHRC in failing to act on any aspect of my very detailed and specific complaints are a clear indication that the IHRC has neither the will nor the authority to investigate the involvement of the Irish Government in human rights abuses.
I do realise that the Irish Human Rights Commissioners are a group of high profile individuals many of whom have had a history of human rights activism. However, the actions and inactions of the IHRC as an organisation on the matter of the use of Shannon airport for the facilitation of human rights abuses are so fundamentally flawed that it should resign forthwith because its continuing existence is providing a false impression that the IHRC is both willing and able to protect against human rights abuses by the state in Ireland.
The IHRC appears to be a watchdog without teeth who fails to bark when murderers and tortures and passing by our front door. Up to 262,000 innocent children have died in Iraq as a result of the unlawful war unleashed on Iraq by the US Government. If the IHRC cannot intervene in Ireland’s complicity in such matters, then it risks being a façade behind which such human rights abuses continue to occur – all form and no function.

I hereby call on all the members of the Irish Human Rights Commission, including the Chairperson, Mr Maurice Manning to resign from this commission, in the interests of human rights, and as an act of atonement for failures to protect the human rights of all those whose deaths and torture have been facilitate by the Irish Government at Shannon airport.

Edward Horgan Commandant (retd.), Newtown, Castletroy, Limerick.

IHRC
Irish Human Rights Commission
15 May 2007
Private and Confidential
Mr Edward Horgan
Charnwood
Newtown
Castletroy
Co Limerick
Our Ref: 06-009/ENQ
Re: Your request to the Commission for an enquiry under section 9(1)(b) of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000, into three matters raised by you.

Dear Mr Horgan,
I refer to previous correspondence regarding your request to the Commission for an enquiry under section 9(1)(b) of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000 (the Act), into three matters raised by you.
Your request for an enquiry has been carefully considered in accordance with the criteria in the Act and the Guidelines for Dealing with Requests under Section 9(1)(b) and Applications under Section 10 of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000, a copy of which was previously forwarded to you.
I regret to inform you that it has been decided not to accede to your request for an enquiry into ‘the alleged use of Shannon airport by U.S. personnel for the rendition of prisoners to other countries for the purposes of illegal detention and torture’ on the following ground:
• An enquiry is not considered either necessary or expedient for the performance of the Commission’s functions under paragraphs (a), (c), (d) or (e) of section 8 of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000.
I also regret to inform you that it has been decided not to accede to you request for an enquiry into ‘the alleged involvement of the State in the facilitation of, and participation in, gross abuses of human rights in Iraq, including unlawful, extra-judicial killings of civilians’ on the following grounds:
• The matter does not come within the jurisdiction of the State and
• An enquiry in not considered either necessary or expedient for the performance of the Commission’s functions under paragraphs (a), (c), (d) or (e) of section 8 of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000.
I further regret to inform you that it has been decided not to accede to your request for an enquiry into ‘the alleged abuse of the Irish judicial system against peace activists in County Clare’ on the following grounds:
• An enquiry in not considered either necessary or expedient for the performance of the Commission’s functions under paragraphs (a), (c), (d) or (e) of section 8 of the Human Rights Commission Act, 2000.
As you know, the Commission has already engaged in substantial work on the “rendition” issue and it will continue to monitor the issue over the coming period. On this occasion, it did not consider it necessary or expedient to conduct an enquiry into the matter for the purposes of the aforementioned functions, however, the information you provided to the Commission in documentation form and at your meeting with Commission officers was most helpful.
The Commission would like to thank you for approaching it with your requests for an enquiry and for the manner in which you supported these requests. If you wish to have the papers which you submitted to the Commission in support of your request returned to you, you might contact me on (01) 858 9601 to discuss arrangements for doing so.

Yours sincerely,
Gerry Finn, Assistant Caseworker, IHRC