Celebrating the Good Friday Agreement

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Friends,

This is a copy of our 'Letter to the Editor' sent to Irish newspapers this week, so far it has been published in The Irish Daily Mail and the Belfast News Letter. There will a lot of Irish media coverage on the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Good Friday Agreement, hopefully they will analyse the shocking double standards that seem to characterise EU and US foreign policy makers on other global conflicts.

Tom Crilly, Communications PANA

Letter to the Editor

Spreading a Philosophy of Peace this Easter

Sir,

President Joe Biden will visit Ireland this Easter, proud of his Irish heritage, he wants to be with us all here in celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Good Friday Agreement.

We are extremely grateful for the contribution of American Presidents and successive American State Departments and many others who saw the need for peace and helped to bridge the seemingly unbridgeable gulfs between Unionism and Nationalism through intense negotiation and reasonable compromise.

One Irish peacemaker John Hume saw the need to spread this message to help end other global conflicts, and in his address to the EU Parliament in 1998 on receiving the Nobel Peace Prize said: "we (the European Union) should not be sending armies abroad, we should be sending a philosophy of peace." Unfortunately, the EU/NATO prefer to be a regional military power and agreed to allocated €7.95 billion between 2021-2027 into developing their arms manufacturing industries.

As political, religious and community leaders gather in Belfast this Easter, some may wonder at the shocking double standards that seem to characterise EU and US foreign policy makers. Do they believe that spreading a philosophy of peace must be based on geopolitical factors?

If pursuing a ceasefire and negotiations to end the war in Ireland is to be celebrated as it should, how much more important would it be to advocate the same philosophy in the horrific war now raging between Russia and NATO in the Ukraine.

Yours,
Roger Cole
Chair
Peace & Neutrality Alliance

For more information:

This year's Roger Casement Summer School 2023 will be on 5/6 May in the usual venue at the Lexicon Library in Dun Laoghaire. Dave Alvey explains in a promotional video some details around this year's School. Here is the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VINox1ih4QQ

Also: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DLRCasement/

The People’s Movement, to see their latest news on EU militarisation…

https://www.people.ie/news/PN-254.pdf

As part of The Conversation from RTÉ's Upfront with Katie Hannon, we asked two people to join our WhatsApp group to discuss the future of Irish neutrality.

Roger Cole is the founder and chairman of the Peace and Neutrality Alliance (PANA).

Declan Power is an independent security and defence analyst and a former Irish soldier.

https://www.rte.ie/news/upfront/2023/0401/1367503-what-does-the-future-hold-for-irish-neutrality/

Depleted uranium shells: Why are they used and are they harmful?

The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) says depleted uranium missiles were developed by the US and UK in the 1970s. They were first used in the Gulf War in 1991, and then in Kosovo in 1999, and during the Iraq War in 2003.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-65051330

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