The Attorney General, Mr. Paul Gallagher SC, is currently undergoing a grilling in Geneva by the UN’s top human rights experts.
The UN Human Rights Committee this morning heard a delegation of Irish non-governmental organisations (NGOs), outline its concerns about Ireland’s lacklustre performance under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
Representatives of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, FLAC (Free Legal Advice Centres), the Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT) were joined by several other Irish NGOs to brief the Human Rights Committee in advance of Ireland’s formal examination this afternoon, 14 July 2008.
Speaking directly from Geneva, ICCL Deputy Director Tanya Ward said:
“For far too long, Ireland has relied on flimsy diplomatic assurances from the U.S. Government to defend its collusion in extraordinary rendition through Shannon Airport. We are bringing a global focus on the State’s domestic failure to live up to its UN human rights obligations.”
Liam Herrick, Executive Director of IPRT stated:
“Although our wealth has grown during the eight years since Ireland’s last report to the Committee, physical conditions and regimes in our prisons are still below acceptable international standards. As we saw only this weekend, increasing levels of violence are making our prisons more dangerous. We are also deeply worried about Government plans to expand the use of imprisonment by increasing prison places and introducing new penal facilities for children and migrants”.
Noeline Blackwell, Director-General of FLAC added:
“We are concerned that the Government is introducing discrimination into the nursery school by denying Child Benefit to the children of asylum seekers and new immigrants into the country. And Ireland is becoming increasingly isolated in Europe because of our failure to accord recognition to transgendered people in their new gender.”
In attempting to defend the Government’s human rights record, the Attorney General has admitted that fully 30 per cent of prison cells still have no in-cell sanitation.
Furthermore, with regard to children in prison, the Attorney General has repeated a commitment that 16 and 17 year olds will be removed from the prison system “as soon as possible”. However, he has made no mention of a time-frame and, at the same time, plans for child detention facilities within Thornton Hall prison are to go ahead.
Most surprisingly, the Atttorney General has not mentioned overcrowding, which is currently a very serious issue in Mountjoy Prison and the Dóchas Centre. There is now a record prison population of 3,600, and there is still no sign of an enforceable ceiling being placed on prisoner numbers.
The Human Rights Committee will continue its scrutiny of Ireland’s human rights record tomorrow (15 July 2008), at which time FLAC, ICCL and the IPRT will issue a further news release.
To download the ICCL/IPRT/FLAC Shadow Report on Ireland’s compliance with the ICCPR, and for full and constantly updated information on Ireland’s examination in Geneva, please visit www.rightsmonitor.org.