PEACE activists here should engage in "direct action" protests against Ireland's small but growing involvement in the international arms trade, according to a woman who helped sabotage a warplane in Britain.
Ms Andrea Needham was speaking during a visit to Ireland for the weekend Feile Bride conference in Kildare. She was one of four women tried in Liverpool for causing £1.5 million worth of damage to a British Aerospace Jet, which they believed was destined for use by Indonesia against East Timor.
The women were acquitted by a jury, but only after spending months in prison on remand.
But Ms Needham said she would be "very happy" to see people engage in direct action protest, "so long as the protests are non violent." While Ireland's involvement in arms trade was small, she admitted, some Irish companies were involved in making secondary components" for weapons which might end up in Indonesia. British Aerospace was also funding research projects in Irish universities, she added.
Ms Needham and another off the four, Ms Jo Wilson, described their experiences to the Kildare conference, which was hosted by the peace and justice group, Afri. Other speakers at the event included refugees from East Timor and Sudan. The conference also featured a "dialogue" between a Lambeg drum and a bodhran, played by a Belfast loyalist and a Kildare nationalist.
Ms Needham and Ms Wilson will address a public meeting in the Earl of Kildare Hotel in Dublin tonight. They visit Belfast tomorrow, where they will meet community leaders.
