Free speech is being curtailed from Boston to Berlin 

Ireland must stand up for its values as neighbours on both sides crack down on protest

Demonstrators gather  in Berlin to protest last week against the possible deportation of four foreign pro-Palestine activists from Germany. The four activists - two from Ireland, one from Poland and one from the United States - face charges relating to their participation in a protest sit-in at Berlin's Free University last year over Israel's invasion of Gaza. Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

There has been much discussion about the introduction of tariffs by the US president and whether these moves finally prove that Ireland’s interests and values lie closer to Berlin than Boston, in Mary Harney’s famous phrasing. 

It would certainly seem that values upheld by Ireland, particularly in relation to freedom of peaceful assembly and expression, may no longer be applicable in Boston or elsewhere in the US for that matter, as students are picked off the streets and detained for expressing their opinion.