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Updated 6pm
FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER Charlie Flanagan has said that Ibrahim Halawa’s hunger strike is “unlikely to serve any positive purpose at all”.
Flanagan said that along with the Taoiseach he met with Halawa’s father and two sisters last week where they were informed by the family of the Irish teenager that he was considering going on hunger strike.
In a letter, which is quoted in today’s Irish Times, Halawa said he is refusing to eat until he is permitted to return to Ireland. He has spent almost two years in an Egyptian prison on charges related to taking part in a pro-Muslim Brotherhood rally.
His last trial was postponed for a seventh time earlier this month.
Flanagan told the Dáil this afternoon that he advised the family against the hunger strike and said this view was shared by Halawa’s lawyer and communicated to the 19-year-old.
The Fine Gael minister reiterated that the Department of Foreign Affairs is maintaining extensive contacts with Egyptian authorities at a high level. He insisted that it was “unrealistic” to expect Halawa to be released until his initial trial concludes.
Flanagan also said that comparisons with the case of freed Australian journalist Peter Greste were not accurate.
Greste, a journalist for Al Jazeera, was released earlier this year following the intervention of Australian prime minister Tony Abbott with Taoiseach Enda Kenny facing calls to make a similar intervention in the Halawa case.
But Flanagan said that in Greste’s case the trial had been concluded:
He had been convicted he had been sentenced… [it was] only when this concluded that authorities were in position to release him.
The minister said that to suggest that Greste was released because of a phone call is “simply wrong” and said it was important to note that different facts and circumstances apply to each case.
He said that Halawa’s trial must be completed “before any political consideration can take place”.
In his most recent letter, the 19 year old, from Tallaght in Dublin, wrote:
Where is human rights? When every morning I wake up to noises of torture knowing I can be next!Where is human rights when I have been thrown in prison for two years with no evidence? Where is the human right when I don’t see the light of the sun? Hit for every word I say that the officer doesn’t like, not allowed hug my own mother.
His sister Somaia told TheJournal.ie that he had “no other option” but to go on hunger strike.
He is fighting for his life. The prison he’s in is inhumane. He only sees his mum behind wires.
Sinn Féin deputy leader, Mary Lou McDonald, today called on Tánaiste Joan Burton to increase efforts to secure Ibrahim’s release.
Tánaiste, what would you if this was your child? You would go to hell and back to secure his release. You would be demanding that the Taoiseach pick up the phone and tell the Egyptian Prime Minister to release this Irish citizen.
The Halawa family say they have become increasingly concerned about his physical and mental wellbeing since the last adjournment.
The Cairo prison he is in is known as “the worst prison in Egypt” and prisoners have killed themselves to get away from the torture committed there, according to his sister Somaia.
In an earlier letter to his family in February, the teenager wrote that he believed the Irish government would “not work hard because I am not white or with me not having an Irish name or even because my religion”.
It is understood that this latest letter was smuggled out of the prison in which he is being held.
The Department of Foreign Affairs, in its most recent statement, said it is committed to seeing Ibrahim released by the Egyptian authorities.
Flanagan “has engaged actively and remains committed to taking all appropriate action to achieve a positive outcome for this young Irishman, Mr Halawa, and his family,” it said.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams said he has written to the Taoiseach to ask him to intervene directly in the case.
It is imperative that the Irish Government exerts top-level pressure on Cairo to secure Ibrahim’s release. It is my firm belief that the Taoiseach needs to make direct contact with the Egyptian President and Prime Minister to appeal to them to release this Irish citizen.
- with reporting from Hugh O’Connell
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Great another new political group. It’s Monty python stuff at this stage
@james comiskey: megaphone politics
@james comiskey:
I look forward to the people’s liberation against profit party.
;)
@Andy #FBPE: people against people before profit
@james comiskey: PBP profit before people
@james comiskey: the artist formerly known as people before profit.
@QhpFny3o: people before people were people.
@james comiskey: SPLITTA!!!!!!
@james comiskey: The Judean People’s Front
They have some decent policies but much of their manifesto is pie in the eye stuff all very surreal, plus they would protest at the opening of an envelope so hard to take them seriously.
@Jonny: whadda we want ?money!!
Whendywewanit?Now!!
Repeat to fade
@Quentin Moriarty: Wasn’t that the banks pre-bailout, or was it redacted?
@Denis McClean: zzzzzz
What do we want!!??
.. houses..water..transport…public services….!
When do we want them?
NOW!
How we will pay for them??
Errmm… ummmm… dunno..
@Dotty Dunleary: we pay for them through general taxation. People like you want to pay for everything twice. You have no issue with the corporate welfare we provide. Everyone paying their fair share of taxes makes for a healthy society but don’t worry FFG are doing Trojan work.
@Frankie Mangan: Exactly. We have the second most progressive tax system in the EU
@Dotty Dunleary: How about corporations and banks paying tax and their fair share of it. You could start with that
@Dotty Dunleary: a rather inane comment to say the least. It is common knowledge that we could quite easily cater for everything required were it not for big corporations, banks and the financial elite continually evading their fair share of taxes.
@Russell Smyth:
No we wouldn’t, any attempt to, good forbid, tax big corporations etc in this small open economy will just mean they will move to somewhere that promises lower taxes.
High net worth individuals and companies are also the most mobile.
People’s front of Judea….. no sorry the judean people’s front
@Graham McGuinness: if you wanna be in the p.f.j you’ve got to really hate the romans!
Brendan Behan’s accurate dictum about “the split” being the first item on the agenda of republican organisations applies to a broader swathe of the Irish political Left.
The ability to find common cause, overcome details of ideology and frame a common and effective approach to election campaigns has not been the strong suit of Irish political leftists.
There are now, and often have been, people of talent and sincerity on the Left in Irish politics who have deserved better hearing and consideration. But in the nothing-for-nothing business of politics, you make your own space and take what luck comes your way.
A high price is paid for self-harm in politics. The Irish Left has frequently excelled in this department.
@Robert Woodward: Very true, the Irish Left has always splintered ad nauseum, is incoherent and unable to provide any kind of stability to potential voters.
@Orla Smith: it’s accounts like yours when I wish the down thumbs were still around
@Orla Smith: is Trump involved?
@Toby Fish: God, would you ever stop going on about him.
@Robert Woodward: FG, FF and Labour have all held together over the decades and they’re centre left parties. We don’t have any right wing parties in this country. A cursory glance at the Tories in the UK will show you that. I think you’re talking about the extreme left. The type that think something as innocuous and necessary as profit is so bad they name themselves based on their opposition to it.
@Toomasu Sumitsu: FG – centre left?! FG are centre right and openly admit they’re centre right!!!
So basically an egotist has thrown his toys from the pram.
Socialism is by it’s nature, idealism.
Although people like John Lyons undoubtedly have the best interests of the people they represent in their heart the art of getting something done is compromise, something most idealists simply cannot do.
@Patrick Nolan: Exactly right.
Best of luck to John, he is an outstanding activist and public representative, who just missed out on a seat in the 2016 election.
@The Risen: is he putting “people” before “people before profit”? Or is he now an enemy of the people?
Before you can lead you must first learn to follow.
The jobseekers party
Just what Ireland needs, another branch on
of the magic money tree :-)
First item on the looney agenda: the split!
PBP is Anti Irish.. Nuff said
When will the “left” ever learn? They need not fear infiltration by the forces of capital or the security services of the states’ establishments: Special Branch, MI5 and CIA et al. They can always rely on self-inflected internal disputes – usually over some silly issue, of no concern to the general public – to cause a split and stymie growth…”when will they ever learn”?
The first thing on the agenda of every meeting of socialists is always the split!!
The People’s Front, The Popular Front, the People’s Popular Front and of course not forgetting the Popular People’s Front!!
@Patrick O’Farrell:
Don’t forget the peoples popular front of Judea
The real reason: It was unprofitable.
‘We resisted the regressive property tax.’ My man, a property tax is the most progressive tax there is. PBP supported Brexit up North which shows you how clueless they are. Richard Boyd Barrett is constantly on RTE (who’s he friends with in there? I could name a couple of people but won’t) which is the only reason they get any votes
The government has implemented a house hold tax spent millions on water meters & creates poverty to force young people to have abortions & the homeless crisis is at its worst.
@Éamonn ÓGallchobhair: forcing young people to have abortions? Get a grip, man.
@James Wallace: Just take a look at Conservative Britain’s stats Leos heros.
@Éamonn ÓGallchobhair: you are either on to many tablets or not enough…….
@John Johnson: He was called Tory Boy in FG for years. he is and has sais so a fan of the economic policies like the trickle down economy,
@John Johnson: U.S.G.A
He should the new party PSP Peoples Shouting Party
Sorry we’ve run out of space to the left you’ll have to leave reality !
Ah now , I think John does put his constituents 1st over & above other considerations . I wish him the best in #LE19
Fair play to john lyons who worked relentlessly against austerity inflicted on the people of ireland by our ganster government
@Michelle Murphy:
Lol no he didn’t
What did be do except hijack others events
Splitter!
So will the lyons tea party be running in two wards are you just all talk?
Who’s Left now, Boomerang Party, He is dead right to get out now and cut his losses before the P B4 P disappear into the breakers yard.
@James Keogh:
What’s PB4P?
Ahh we await the new “Lyons Tea Party”
I’ll miss this guys comedic value. I guess the revolution just hasn’t started quick enough for this self described revolutionary socialist who spends more time going on about the Islamic State of Palesrina than he does about Irish issues
Laters bud. Save a blunt for me
Far left politician resigns from party.
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