Our Peace Vigil at Shannon today was a windy affair but Spring was in the air, so the joys of the season should have been evident. However Shannonwatch and other NGO research has revealed that war related deaths of children in the Middle East since the 1991 First Gulf War may have amounted to up to one million children dead. Since we in Ireland have been partly complicit in these deaths as a result of US military use of Shannon Airport we had started a project to try and put names on as many of these children who have died as possible. To us and of course to their families these children's deaths are not just "collateral damage".

From our Court Correspondent

This case arises as a result of a communicative peace activist protest action taken by Colm Roddy and Dave Donnelan on 25 May 2016, when they entered Shannon airport to search two US military aircraft, which they felt legally and morally obliged to search, because Gardai at Shannon airport have been directed by the Irish Government not to search or investigate any US military aircraft at Shannon airport.

Last night (Jan 24th) was a busy night for warplanes at Shannon Airport. At 6pm a Shannonwatch member photographed a Miami Air aircraft that may have been trying to disguise its presence at there, or at least disguise the fact that it is on contract to the US military.

The aircraft number was N739MA. It took off from Pease Air Force Base in the USA and landed at Shannon on Monday at 08:42 using a civilian call sign BSK171. It took off from Shannon again at 10:05 then flew on towards Europe and landed at Chania airport in Crete, this time using a US military call sign and then headed for Muwaffaq Salti Airbase, near Al Azraq, Jordan.

In answer to recent parliamentary questions from Clare Daly TD the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade gave some sparse details of the foreign military traffic that passes through Ireland. Any of these that are engaged in war-related activities are of course is in breach of Irish neutrality.

Analysis of Shannonwatch data shows that over 730 US military flights landed at Shannon in 2016. That's more than 2 a day over the entire year. Of these, 413 were operated by the US Air Force, Navy or military, and the remainder were contracted troop carriers like Omni Air International.

Since August 2008 at total of at least 7,988 US military planes carrying armed troops or cargo have landed at the airport. This does not include suspect rendition planes and planes not identifying themselves as attached to the CIA or US military which have undountedly also landed there.