Almost €200k spent on protecting US planes at Shannon Airport last year

The Government spent almost €200,000 last year basing soldiers at Shannon Airport to protect US air force planes travelling to and from war zones from attacks by protesters.

Department of Defence general secretary, Maurice Quinn, risked sparking fresh public anger over the use of the facility by US planes after confirming the situation at a cross-party meeting with politicians.

Speaking at the latest Dáil public accounts committee meeting as US president Donald Trump announced plans to ramp up “black operations” and openly approved of using torture on terrorism suspects, Mr Quinn said Ireland spent €181,669 to protect US planes at the airport in 2016 alone.

Responding to concerns from unaligned Independent TD for Galway West Catherine Connolly about the cost of “protecting planes”, Mr Quinn said soldiers and other officials under the department’s control are not permanently based at Shannon.

However, citing the €181,669 figure, he said the department must “answer the call of the civil power” at the airport should help be requested, adding: “If they ring you tomorrow you will have to go”.

Mr Quinn was not asked to provide exact figures for how much the Government has spent on protecting US planes at Shannon since the second US-Iraq war began in 2003 when activity at the facility increased drastically during the PAC meeting.

However, if the 2016 expenditure is in line with other years, it would mean almost €2.4m worth of taxpayers’ money has been spent on the protection measures over the past 13 years.

The use of Shannon airport by US planes re-fuelling after travelling from Iraq, Afghanistan, other parts of the middle east and other unnamed locations has caused repeated controversy since former US president George W Bush began the self-styled “war on terror” in response to the 911 attacks.

This is because of disputed claims that some US planes re-fuelling at the facility are carrying suspects to parts of the world where torture interrogation techniques can be used — a situation that is in marked contravention of international law — so there are concerns that the use of Shannon effectively means Ireland is not remaining neutral in US wars.

A number of protesters have been taken to court over the past decade for attempting to inspect US planes re-fuelling at Shannon, including Independents4Change TDs Clare Daly and Mick Wallace; members of the Workers’ Party and Sinn Féin; and unaligned individuals.

In April 2015, Ms Daly and Mr Wallace were convicted of breaching airport by-laws at Ennis district court and fined €2,000 for scaling a fence and attempting to carry out searches of planes.