Workers Solidarity Movement

The Dublin Anarchist Black Cross was in attendance of this year's anti-internment march in Belfast on the 7th August. Prior to the march taking place the state put a block on the march from going ahead refusing to give the march organisers permission to march. This block did not deter people from coming out in support of the march and come out in solidarity with political prisoners in prisons in Ireland.

Over 1,000 people marched from the Busy Bee in Andersonstown in west Belfast, down the Falls Road towards Belfast City Hall. When the march reached the end of the Falls Road the Police had the road blocked with a line/siege of armored Jeeps and armed police preventing the march from reaching its destination.

Anarchists in Derry took part in a series of solidarity actions in a show of international support and solidarity with anarchists and antifascists imprisoned in Russia.

Last month the Anarchist Black Cross of Moscow issued an international call for solidarity in support of activists currently facing an extremely intensive political and repressive situation in Russia, especially anarchist and antifa comrades and those fighting for human rights and social justice issues.

On Saturday in Newry Co Down the Anti-Interment Group of Ireland held a white line picket to highlight the prison struggle and fight for justice of Republican prisoners. Dublin Anarchist Black Cross attended and sent us the following report on the protest.

“There were many people in attendance from different groups and organizations giving their solidarity. there was a police presence throughout the picket.

Representatives from four different groups read out statements Cogus, Dublin Anarchist Black Cross, I.R.P.W.A and the Save Moore Street Campaign. The chairperson, Cabs Kavanagh, of the Anti-Interment Group of Ireland thanked everyone and every group in attendance.

Saturday 18th December saw activists from a number of pro-choice organizations including the WSM rally at the GPO in Dublin to mark the European Court of Human Rights ruling in the ABC case. The short rally which took place in the bitter cold had been called at just over 24 hours notice by the Feminist Open Forum but still attracted a few dozen activists who have been involved in campaigning against Ireland's ban on abortion in the last decades.

Doctors For Choice welcomes the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights in favour of one of the three women applicants in the ABC case and demands that the government now legislate on abortion provision as a matter of urgency. Much time wasting and obstruction has taken place while womens health has been, and continues to be compromised by the lack of abortion provision in Ireland. This ruling confirms what Irish doctors have known for many years; that Irish women are being denied reproductive justice in their own country. The three cases were representative of a broad spectrum of women who are forced to travel abroad to access abortion.

Dr Mary Favier, a Cork GP and a founder member of Doctors for Choice, says the ABC case decision is a hugely welcome, important and significant decision. That will make a fundamental difference and force the government to legislate for the X Case. She then explains the background to the ABC v Ireland case currently before the European Court of Human Rights. She explains why the outcome of the case (and the issues it raises) are central to the predicament currently faced my thousands of Irish women every year in Ireland. Pointing out the Irish Government has fought the three women (A, B and C) along every step of their long and arduous route to the European Court, she also addresses the issue of the silence of within the Irish medical profession in relation to the matter of abortion. Over 5000 Irish women leave Ireland each year to have abortions in European countries.

The anti-woman, anti-choice group Youth Defence have launched a new advertising campaign which includes targetted Facebook ads ahead of the anticipated ABC decision in the European courts.  In this case three women, known as A, B and C, are challenging Ireland’s ban on abortion in the European Court of Human Rights on the grounds that the law jeopardised their health and their well being and that travelling abroad for an abortion placed "enormous physical, emotional and financial burdens" upon them. Because the law created delays and hardships for each woman, it resulted in each of them having a later abortion, creating a greater risk to their health.