BLAGAROON

Monday, September 06, 2010

BLAIR FORCED
TO CANCEL TOUR
AFTER DUBLIN
PROTEST

Former British Premier, Tony Blair, has cancelled his book signing tour after vigorous protests in Dublin at the weekend against his visit received world-wide coverage. Police in the Irish Capital had sealed off the bookstore in Dublin’s main street, O’Connell, where hundreds of protesters from several organisations turned up to denounce his presence in Ireland and remind the public of the horrendous results of Blair’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003. Blair announced this himself on British TV this morning when he cancelled his next scheduled appearance in London on Wednesday going ahead because of promised mass protests there by Stop the War Coalition and British CND.

If the Blair publicity circus thought they were going to have a quiet weekend in Dublin, they were badly mistaken. Crowds gathered two hours before the start of the book signing and carried on a continuous loud chanting and speeches denouncing Blair as a war criminal and demanding his arrest. One protester, Kate O’Sullivan, from the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, managed to evade the tight security cordon and confront Mr Blair inside the bookstore, but, as she declared the citizen’s arrest she was pounced on by armed guards and detained. Shortly afterwards, as Blair was about to leave the store through the front entrance, the crush of crowds against the police barriers broke through into the cordoned area and Blair had to run a gauntlet of thrown eggs, plastic bottles and shoes from the angry crowd before getting to his car.. A melee ensued with police who drew batons and several protesters were arrested. They were later released after being charged with offences.

Once again. Irish people have taken the lead in confronting the warmongers and death-dealers of Imperialism and small victory as it may be, it was done in the name of the million dead of Iraq and the daily suffering of the people of Palestine and Afghanistan and elsewhere in the world. It is also a reminder to the murderers that they cannot live with impunity after their appalling crimes against humanity but, will be forever confronted and called to account until justice is done.

Blair’s book is a cynical attempt to whitewash the crimes committed in Iraq and contains blatant warmongering for a military assault on Iran and psychopathic Islamophobia to justify the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and the continued suffering of the people there. The Irish protesters also called for Blair’s removal from his post as Middle-East envoy of the Quartet group where he has shown total bias towards Zionist Israel and their piratical acts.