Gas pipeline objectors to hold protest rally

Opponents of a controversial gas pipeline in Co Mayo are today protesting against Minister Noel Dempsey’s role in the €900m project.

Around 50 Shell to Sea campaigners will be holding a rally outside the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, in response to Mr Dempsey’s decision to allow work to go ahead on the offshore section of the pipeline.

Shell to Sea Dublin will be handing in a letter at the department inviting the minister to a meeting with family and supporters of the ‘Rossport Five’.

The group is also inviting oil giant Shell, who has suspended work on the pipeline pending a safety review announced by Mr Dempsey, to send representatives to the meeting to discuss the future of the project.

The five men from Rossport, Co Mayo, were jailed six weeks ago for refusing to obey a High Court order preventing them from obstructing the construction of the pipeline.

They want the gas to be refined offshore rather than transported along the pipeline beside their homes to the onshore refinery.

A spokesman for Shell to Sea Dublin said the group wanted to put the focus on decisions made by the Natural Resources Minister in relation to the proposed pipeline.

“We intend to make it clear that increasing numbers of Irish people are supportive of the stand taken by the ‘Rossport Five’ in opposition to the pipeline, and to the handover of our natural resources to multinational corporations without any appreciable benefit to the Irish people,” the spokesman said.