Press Releases & Updates 2003

The peace activists poured human blood on the runway that has been servicing U.S. military flights, troop and munitions deployments to U.S. military bases in Kuwait and Qatar. They constructed a shrine on the runway to Iraqi children killed and threatened by U.S./British bombardment and sanctions. The shrine consisted of copies of the Bible and Quran, rosary and Muslim prayer beads, flowers, photographs of Iraqi children and Brigid’s crosses. They then began to take up the runway, working on its edge with a mallet.

The activists approached the hanger housing a US Navy Plane under repair. They painted "Pit stop of death" on the hanger’s roller door, and began the dismantling of the hanger. They then entered the hanger to disarm the repaired US warplane. The plane in question according to Ciaron was the same plane that protester Mary Kelly hit with a hatchet in the recent past. They prayed together.

Having been arrested by Gardai, the ’Shannon 5’ were imprisoned on remand at Limerick Prison and have initiated fasts for peace and called for mass non-violent resistance to the illegal refueling of American Military aircraft at Shannon.

Karen, writing from prison, explained, "The same people who make the law, break the law and lie. They are also the people who believe that locking people up 22 hours a day and allowing them to be treated as "illiterate dregs" of society will rehabilitate them to the "programme". It does not work. The process of my incarceration reaffirms my beliefs and justifies my struggle for a more peaceful world and an end to war."

Karen was the last of the five activists to be released on bail, and was freed on Good Friday. No trial date has yet been set.

For more information:

http://www.ploughsharesireland.org

http://www.catholicworker.org

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