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MORE THAN 4,000 people have signed an online petition calling for 65-year-old Teresa Treacy to be freed from prison.
Ms Treacy was jailed at Mountjoy Prison’s Dochas Centre two weeks ago for contempt of court after refusing to obey an order allowing Eirgrid and the ESB to carry out work on her land near Tullamore, Co Offaly. Ms Treacy has pledged to protect the trees on her property, where the two companies plan to construct an overhead power line.
The petition calls for Ms Treacy to be released and for an end to the stand-off, asking the ESB and Eirgrid to consider running the wires underground instead. It adds: “We believe it is unjust and undemocratic that she be jailed for trying to protect the environment of her privately-owned land.”
Some 4,081 people had added their signatures at the time of writing. According to a spokesperson for the Teresa Treacy Support Group, Ms Treacy has been informed by prison staff that the Dochas Centre has also received more than 25,000 letters and emails in support of her cause.
People have been taking to Twitter to express their support. Dublin councillor Gerard Mannix Flynn has urged people to lobby the seven presidential candidates over the issue, while musician Sharon Corr wrote:
Over the last week, protesters have been attempting to prevent contractors from felling trees at the site. Work has stopped over the weekend, with the ESB and Eirgrid saying yesterday that only a day and a half of tree cutting remains to be done.
However, the support group spokesperson suggested that the companies were exaggerating their progress to discourage people from becoming involved in a protest camp that has been set up on Ms Treacy’s land. He said work had stopped over the weekend, adding:
They have cut down a substantial amount of trees. But it would be our view that they are exaggerating to create the impression that the work is done, that its too late for people to interfere. But that’s not true. Where they have felled trees, people are planting fresh saplings. The land is protected by a protest camp, and over 100 people have been coming and going over the last few days.
He said tree nurseries “from around the country” had donated young trees to be planted on the land, and urged supporters to attend a protest planned outside the ESB headquarters on St Stephen’s Green in Dublin at midday on Tuesday.
An Eirgrid spokesperson today told TheJournal.ie that the two companies “very much regret that the situation have come to this position”, adding: “The only reason this line is being built is that ESB and Eirgrid have a statutory responsibility to build a safe, reliable, economical power structure across Ireland.”
He rejected suggestions that the lines could be routed underground instead, saying that would make them less reliable and increase costs for electricity consumers. He continued: “Overhead lines are the internationally accepted method of distributing high voltage electricity. About 98.5 per cent of lines worldwide are overhead.”
In a statement issued yesterday, the two companies said:
A feature of the companies’ plans is a major programme of planting of replacement trees, following the construction of the vital electricity line [...] The electricity line development concerned will be critical to maintaining secure, reliable power in the Midlands.
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Practical solution? How about Russia withdraws back where they came from?
The Russians are desperate for any tiny victory and are getting more and more reckless and dangerous to grasp it.
@Tom Quinn: it takes them 2 months to capture a village we are gonna see them do worse things as this drags on
@Seán Ó Briain: Sean, instead of throwing a tantrum and going with the usual and predictable fake account, Russian bot BS because things aren’t going your way, how about looking at some cold hard facts?
Satellite images showing the position of the Russian forces, video of the attack and its aftermath. Note that they are approx 50 metres from a whole hell of a lot of nuclear waste. If you are comfortable with Ukraine dropping explosives that flaming close to a shed load of nuclear waste that’s fine by me but I doubt the rest of the world would agree with you.
It is a cold, hard fact that Ukraine fired explosives within an incredibly close distance of spent nuclear fuel and no amount of spin can get away from that. There was another strike there last night with the local officials saying that one of the missiles struck within 10 metres of the spent fuel. Although seeing as how the official is part of the occupational government I’d take his report with some reservation. In this case, I would wait until satellite imagery is available to confirm it.
The thing is that the only party so far to actually confirm that they have attacked the area is the Ukrainians themselves. While a drone strike would do little damage to the reactor, a hit on the spent fuel would be a disaster of their own making.
@Digital Marketing Growth with Jarvis.ai-Free Trial: But it is unavoidably Russias fault. They shouldn’t bloody be there in the first place, and no amount of half baked essays on ‘duh facts’ can cover that.
@TheJournal Here’s a link to your own comments policy because you obviously need a refresher. (thejournal.ie/comments-policy)
Is journal. ie censorship a thing. 16 comments yet only 9 on display.
My comment from earlier GONE
@Gerry Dornan: it certainly is Gerry and apparently on the rise. Plenty of lively and interesting threads deleted for no apparent reason.
Heard recently that the Russian plan is to survive till winter. When its gets bitterly cold in Europe and then they stop all gas supplies to Europe. Will Europe see electricity blackouts and rationing of energy. Europe is very much dependent on Russian energy and what will happen without it. Will we see industry forced to stop. Factories shut down. Germany is heavily dependent on Russian gas for electricity.
It’s all about Geopolitics…. a big game playing out in front of millions. The ruble vs the petrodollar!!!
@Diarmuid O’Braonáin: Russian gas exports are down overall but because of the price being so high they are actually making more for less. Add to that the fact that China, India and other countries taking up the slack from the EU and Russia is doing OK for themselves so far.
In the meantime the EU and especially Germany are screwed, we are paying over the odds for fossil fuels and all because of a knee-jerk reaction by our EU overlords. You can be guaranteed that the people who thought out (or didn’t as the case may be) these sanctions won’t be freezing this winter. No planning for future energy security and kowtowing to the US means that the whole of the EU is in a bad way.
Putin’s forces will dig into the areas that it has captured and slowly advance from there. In the meantime, people in the EU will start suffering blackouts and will have to watch their TVs while wrapped up in blankets and sleeping bags. It’s all very fine now but comes the winter it will be interesting to see what public sentiment is.
Russia has plenty of energy supplies to keep its population warm and its economy going something that the EU won’t have. When sanctions really start to bite and its people in the EU feel the worst effects I expect that people mightn’t be so harsh to criticise people like Sabina Higgins calling for ceasefire and negotiations.
@Digital Marketing Growth with Jarvis.ai-Free Trial:
what should the EU have done after the invasion happened?
Don’t tell us what they ‘shouldn’t have done’ we’ve got that from your comments already.
Tell us what they ‘should have’ done after February 23rd.
have your say