Global Women's Strike calls picket on Army Barracks

national | miscellaneous | news report Tuesday March 18, 2003 16:38 by Global Women's Strike, Galway - Global Women's Strike

WOMEN SAY NO WAR --INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING. Ireland, North and South, United for Neutrality

Women's Picket and Speak-Out at Renmore Army Barracks, Galway Wednesday 19th March @ 11.00 am sharp The Global Women's Strike calls on women and men to Strike Out Against War with a women's picket and non-party political grassroots speak-out at the Army Barracks in Renmore, Galway. All welcome. Bring relatives and friends! The Strike calls on all anti-war groups to organise similar pickets at local army barracks, Garda stations and other sites of support for this war - Shannon airport, government offices, the Dail, arms manufacturers and companies making 'dual purpose' materials. Already, women and men in Derry are giving a lead by picketing Raytheon, the giant arms manufacturer every week. On Monday, non-violent direct action began to sweep the United States, from Washington DC in the east to Los Angeles in the west, against the second war (Afghanistan was the first) aiming for a US military takeover of the world....

18th March 2003

WOMEN SAY NO WAR --INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING
IRELAND NORTH AND SOUTH UNITED FOR NEUTRALITY

Women's Picket and Speak-Out at Renmore Army Barracks, Galway
Wednesday 19th March @ 11.00 am sharp

The Global Women's Strike calls on women and men to Strike Out Against War with a women's picket
and non-party political grassroots speak-out at the Army Barracks in Renmore, Galway. All welcome.
Bring relatives and friends!

The Strike calls on all anti-war groups to organise similar pickets at local army barracks, Garda stations
and other sites of support for this war - Shannon airport, government offices, the Dail, arms manufacturers and
companies making 'dual purpose' materials. Already, women and men in Derry are giving a lead by picketing Raytheon,
the giant arms manufacturer every week.

On Monday, non-violent direct action began to sweep the United States, from Washington DC in the east to Los Angeles
in the west, against the second war (Afghanistan was the first) aiming for a US military takeover of the world. (The US
army calls it 'full spectrum dominance".)

In US cities and towns, local governments, trade unions, veterans, many of them not recovered from the last war, have declared
opposition to war, and survivors and the families of victims of 9/11 have acted against this war, saying Not in our name. Above all,
women who with our children make up the majority of casualties and of refugees, are coming out to say No War. We know that every casualty,
every collateral damage, every victim of friendly fire, is some mother's daughter, some mother's son.

In Aznar's Spain, a 15-minute general strike on Friday was 80% effective.

Maggie Ronayne, co-ordinator of the Global Women's Strike in Ireland, says, 'There can be no business as usual for an Irish government which
cravenly violates the constitution in order to befriend and get us to work for and protect rogue States like the US, a government that ignores
what the vast majority of people here and in the world have clearly said: we want NO WAR ON IRAQ.'

On the 8th of March, the 4th Global Women's Strike's caravan to Shannon airport learned that the Gardai did not want to be doing the work of
supporting the war effort by protecting warplanes from us. We know that the army are also uneasy about doing this work. They would be supporting
an illegal war, a massive racist slaughter, as women of colour at our Strike events described. This support work for war crimes makes them liable for
prosecution, along with Bush, Blair and Aznar.

On the picket, women the carers, mothers, sisters and daughters of soldiers trained to kill and be killed, will call them to refuse this job! Men who support
the Global Women's Strike are speaking out about the long tradition of refusal of the work of killing. One of the most recent is the refuseniks in the Israeli army,
which gets over $3 billion a year from the US to keep the Middle East under US/Israeli domination.
Truly War is the enemy of the poor, as Martin Luther King was killed for saying.

Therese Maher, a mother who has joined Strike actions for the past three years, said, 'We are demanding to know from Bertie, Bush, Blair and company: why is the work of
giving birth to and caring for every precious human being and our planet unwaged, under-resourced and unvalued, when armies are paid to kill and military budgets stand at
over $900 billion a year?'

Women on the picket will ask rank and file soldiers and gardai - is their lousy take-home pay enough to compensate for what the government are implicating them in and the
problems they face in Shannon? Our mothers taught us to refuse to do what thugs like Bush and Blair tell us to.

There has never been a more urgent time to act for life and against mass murder. We are doing this for our children too, so they - along with women and men of every age, race
and income level - are more than welcome on our picket.

St Patrick's Day marches in both Dublin and Galway had women's contingents and other anti-war activities. We will not go away! We are demanding the military budget for caring
and we will change the world, in the home and outside; in the North and in the South; in Ireland and everywhere.

Ends

1. For further information telephone: Maggie Ronayne 087 7838688 or maggie_ronayne@hotmail.com
2. This is an independent women's non-party political event called by the Global Women's Strike. We welcome the participation all other anti-war organisations. The Strike in Ireland
is part of a global network in over 70 countries and is co-ordinated in Ireland and internationally by the Wages for Housework Campaign. We welcome non-party political support from all
sectors of the anti-war movement who respect the autonomy of grassroots women and what we are organising in Ireland and globally.
3. For further updates, see: http://womenstrike8m.server101.com or email womenstrike8m@server101.com For more information on men's support: payday@paydaynet.org and for information on
men refusing military service see website: http://www.paydaynet.org