Letters to the Editor: Awarding peace prize to prime minister of Qatar is shameful
His Excellency Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, prime minister and minister of foreign affairs of Qatar, at the Great National Ballykisteen Hotel.
The Tipperary Peace Prize is Ireland’s award for humanitarian work.
The awarding of the prize to His Excellency Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, the prime minister of Qatar, is a dreadful insult to those who founded the Tipperary Peace Convention in 1983.
The state of human rights in Qatar is a concern for several non-governmental organisations, such as Human Rights Watch, which reported in 2012 that hundreds of thousands of mostly South Asian migrant construction workers in Qatar risk serious exploitation and abuse, sometimes amounting to forced labour and death.
Qatar is an authoritarian state and de facto absolute monarchy.
Qatari law also does not permit the establishment of political bodies or trade unions.
Awareness of human rights abuses in Qatar grew internationally after the country was chosen by Fifa to stage the 2022 World Cup.
Domestic servants, who are often women from poorer African, South Asian, and South-East Asian countries, have little to no rights and often become victims of human and sex trafficking, including prostitution.
Individual rights and civil liberties in general are also highly restrictive in Qatar, such as the freedom of association, freedom of expression, and freedom of the press.
In addition, sodomy laws exist to punish offenders, for both males and females.
Qatar’s legal system is a mixture of civil law and Islamic Sharia law.
Flogging and capital punishment are also enforced.
Qatari authorities have been accused of allowing financiers who were on international blacklists to live freely in the country: “There are US- and UN-designated terrorist financiers in Qatar that have not been acted against under Qatari law.”
Accusations come from a wide variety of sources, including intelligence reports, government officials, and journalists.
How any of the above meets the criteria for awarding such a prestigious humanitarian peace prize is beyond my comprehension.
It is stomach-churning to think people of the magnitude of John Hume, Nelson Mandela, Ted Kennedy, and Mary Robinson have been placed alongside this despicable regime.
Perhaps the members of the convention or those responsible would reconsider their decision to save further embarrassment for the proud people of Tipperary and, indeed, the country of Ireland.
We can now truly measure how much we have lost our way as a species when US president Donald Trump is nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
It’s a sick joke.
Emboldened by Trump, Netanyahu sees no issue in presenting a post-war plan for Palestine that does not speak to a two-state solution but furthers the subjugation of Palestinians.
Meanwhile, US commentators scratch their heads at how the passing of Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ is surely providing the Democrats with the perfect electoral stick to beat the Republicans at midterm.
However, they are not considering the now plausible possibility that Trump may see elections and a functioning Congress as an unnecessary impediment to his absolute power.
The recent military intervention in Los Angeles may have been a precursor for future fabricated emergencies to further consolidate his grip.
Where is the EU in all of this? Lack of unanimity on the topic of Gaza and dealing with Trump has left it apparently impotent, while a dysfunctional UN Security Council further erodes the ability of UN agencies to provide support and security to the most vulnerable.
With each passing day and the increased hardening of positions by the world’s autocrats, sources of hope lessen.
Surely we are witnessing the ultimate perverse irony.
The leader of the state that has carried out ethnic cleansing, building to genocide, is proposing the leader of the country that has financially and militarily backed those very actions for the Nobel Peace Prize.
No longer can we debate where the moral compass is — this is the smallest deviant circle without a compass.
The history of the Nobel Peace Prize tells us it has always been based on merit and, indeed, very few, if any, of its many illustrious recipients have been involved in controversy.
It is a ‘noble’ prize, awarded to those who have devoted their lives to eliminating conflict; promoting harmony; upholding human dignity; eliminating poverty; providing aid, medical care, and food to downtrodden nations.
Among its most recent recipients are Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Betty Williams, Mairead Corrigan, John Hume, Martin Luther King, and Mother Teresa — all deserving of the award.
How nauseating then to witness from the White House a person wanted universally for war crimes nominating a convicted criminal for that very prize.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu could stop the war — he is the protagonist.
Instead, he allows his army to indiscriminately, on a daily basis, murder women and children and deprive them of food and water.
US president Donald Trump provides him with the weapons to carry out these atrocities, so in reality the charade in the White House is a ploy to have Trump nominated for the peace prize just to satisfy his vainglory.
Trump has withdrawn from the World Health Organization; has cancelled USAid to the poorest countries; has detained those who oppose his policies; has created global economic chaos; and has deported, without trial, numbers of citizens to hell-hole prisons in other countries.
Considering him for this prestigious prize would be an insult to previous nominees and a demeaning of the award.
Recently, a committee has been formed to fully research and document the lives and times of famous athletic brothers Bill and Con Phibbs.
Born in North Cork, the brothers came to live with their family at Bridestown in Kildinan, between Rathcormac and Glenville.
In the 1880s and 1890s, the two brothers were among the leading athletes in Ireland.
Bill travelled to the US in 1888 with the GAA’s ‘invasion’ team.
Con later worked in Scotland and was imprisoned for his Volunteer activity during the War of Independence.
Bill died in 1939 and Con 10 years later.
Both are buried in Glanworth.
We are trying to contact any living relatives and also to get further family information and photographs if possible.
If you can help, please contact me at foxyjohnarnold@hotmail.com.
Recently, I found myself in the back room of a small bar in North Cork.
A silent television proved a distraction to conversation as it showed pictures of death and destruction in Gaza.
An image of a motionless baby, body wrapped as if mummified, arms outstretched as if crucified, stopped us all.
And then the baby opened its eyes. I say ‘it’ because this baby had no name by which I could comfort them.
It was a statistic, a casualty, a victim.
In witnessing this horror, all I could hear were the vain attempts to restrain tears and the screaming in my head.
Why is this barbarity allowed to continue and why is Ireland doing so little in response?
I accept that Ireland, as a contracting party to the Genocide Convention, has intervened in South Africa’s case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) but, under Article 1 of the convention, we are still obliged to prevent genocide while the protracted legal arguments proceed, not just seek justice after the fact.
I do not know the tipping point for proof of genocide (Article 2) but there is general agreement among international lawyers that the ‘lesser’ sin of war crimes, at a minimum, are being daily inflicted on those under the control of Israel in Gaza and the West Bank.
While the Irish Government’s continuing paralysis on the Occupied Territories Bill persists, Israel acts with impunity and hundreds more innocent lives are lost.
Since March 18, on average, 60 people a day have been killed by the Israel Defence Forces; starvation is a constant and access to safe drinking water is limited to about one in 10 of the population.
And still the Government procrastinates and prevaricates, waiting on others to act.
This, despite Taoiseach Micheál Martin’s appraisal that Israel is “committing genocide in Gaza right now” (Leaders’ Questions, May 28).
We know leadership to the east and west of us is cavalier towards the human rights of the people of Gaza and the West Bank, morally crippled by self-interests, including the sales of military equipment.
Thankfully, we did not vote them into power but we did vote for the Irish Government based on its 2024 manifesto.
People are dismayed by its vision for a diluted Occupied Territories Bill and all its inadequacies. If, as it claims, it is based on the 2024 ICJ Advisory Opinion, at least get on with it.
Meanwhile, the use of Shannon Airport by the US military, supposedly for refuelling and resupplying, is a concern that successive governments have sidestepped for decades.
The concern that the US military use it to deliver weapons to the IDF must be addressed.
Who is accountable to the Oireachtas and the Irish people for policing US military use?
Is the Government satisfied that the use of the airport is legal?
To quote UN special rapporteur Francesca Albanese: “International law is as strong and as effective as the political will of member states to enforce it.” Why is Ireland doing so little in response?
