This article is from page 15 of the 2006-06-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 15 JPG
IT WAS only last August that another suspected CIA plane landed at Shannon Airport provoking scathing criticism from peace activists who slammed the “brazen display of yet another US Government aircraft known to be operated by the CIA.”
The twin propeller DHC-6 Twin Otter arrived in Shannon from Spain on Saturday August 6 and left shortly after midday on Monday 8. The presence of the aircraft at Shannon reignited the row which erupted the previous year about the Clare airport being used by the US military to illegally transport Al Qaeda suspects to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and Egypt.
In October 2004, a group of mid- west based activists made a formal complaint to gardaí following claims that another CIA plane, a corporatestyle Gulfstream aircraft with the registration N379P and nicknamed the “Guantanamo Bay Express”, had been used by the U.S. to “effectively kidnap so-called high-value targets and transport them around the world.” The plane has been sighted at Shannon on several occasions in recent years.
Well known local peace activist Tim Hourigan said at the time, “I am disgusted that yet again, the CIA can bring its jets in through Shannon without any interest or hindrance from the Irish state or the Garda Síochána. It has been repeatedly brought to the attention of the Irish government that CIA operations are being conducted through Shannon using a variety of front companies. Rather than investigate any of the detailed criminal complaints, the Government continues to blindly accept the assurances of the US ambassador that nothing is going on”.
The aircraft seen at Shannon last August, registration N6161Q, belongs to a company called Aviation Specialists Inc which unusually, has a P.O. Box in Washington as its only contact information. The aircraft, which was parked close to the roadway at Shannon, was equipped with a number of very unusual blade antennae on the upper fuselage not standard to that type of plane.
The aircraft is believed to be operated by a special paramilitary unit of the CIA, known as the Special Operations Group (SOG) which is part of the Special Activities Division (SAD) and has been tracked by plane spotters around the World.
Mr. Hourigan added, “the Dept of Foreign Affairs would have been well aware of the fact that plane spotters around the globe have been tracking many of these aircraft, including the landing of this plane, N6161Q, in Iraq, Afghanistan, the CIA landing strip at Camp Peary, and the secretive Desert Rock airfield in Nevada. It is a disgrace, that the CIA, with its history of torture, murders, coups, secret wars and drug dealing can be allowed parking space at Shannon. It would appear that we have surrendered even the pretence of sovereignty in our relations with the Bush administration and the CIA”.