DUBLIN/BRUSSELS (own report) – Ireland has seen major demonstrations against a de facto abolition of the country’s longstanding neutrality in favour of militarisation within the EU framework. On Saturday, around a thousand people took to the streets in Dublin to demonstrate against the government’s planned abolition of the ‘Triple Lock’. The Triple Lock is a constitutional mechanism that requires any mission involving more than twelve Irish soldiers to have been approved by a UN Security Council or UN General Assembly resolution. This arrangement is intended to help preserve the country’s historic neutrality. Ireland’s neutrality is deeply rooted in the country’s history under British colonial rule. The rejection of involvement in wars in foreign countries – especially alongside the United Kingdom – is “a core element of poplar Irish national sentiment,” explains Anthony Coughlan, professor emeritus at Trinity College Dublin and spokesperson for the National Platform EU Research and Information Centre, in an interview with german-foreign-policy.com. The government’s attempt to make it possible to break the tradition of neutrality by removing the Triple Lock is seen in part as a consequence of Irish elites becoming integrated in the EU establishment. Read more

DUBLIN german-foreign-policy.com spoke with Anthony Coughlan about Ireland’s neutrality, the Triple Lock which is intended to secure neutrality, and the Irish government’s efforts to abolish it. Coughlan is Associate Professor Emeritus in Social Policy at Trinity College Dublin. He has written extensively on nationality questions and the European Union. He is spokesman for the National Platform EU Research and Information Centre in the Irish capital. Coughlan believes that the Irish elite’s plan to abolish the Triple Lock is aimed at enabling them to fully participate in the EU’s measures against Russia, potentially military ones included. The transformation of welfare states into warfare states is progressing in Ireland just as it is in other EU countries. Coughlan expects that resistance to the abolition of the Triple Lock will get stronger as Irish people who are opposed to EU war-mongering, who want to end the Ukraine war and who want to prevent a new Cold War with Russia will not be prepared to abandon neutrality without a real fight. Read more

DUBLIN Interview with Anthony Coughlan, Professor Emeritus in Social Policy at Dublin University (Trinity College Dublin), Director of the National Platform EU Research and Information Centre, writer and commentator on EU affairs. Read more

DUBLIN german-foreign-policy.com interviewed Roger Cole on Irish neutrality and the Lisbon Treaty referendum. Roger Cole is Chair of the Irish Peace and Neutrality Alliance (PANA, www.pana.ie). Read more