Some 25 shackled and blindfolded "prisoners" were led by armed "guards" through the streets of Galway yesterday as part of an Amnesty International call for the closure of Guantánamo Bay and other US detention centres.
The silent march from Eyre Square was met with a hushed response from lunchtime shoppers, and the protest finished with a symbolic demonstration at Spanish Arch against the illegal use of torture. The absence of speeches, flyers, chants or microphones was designed to highlight the "silence" and "complicity" of the Government and its European counterparts on the issue, said Amnesty International campaigns officer Jameen Kaur.
Participants included a 10-year-old Galway school pupil and campaign supporters from Japan, Italy, Sweden and Britain. This was to emphasise that the youngest detainee at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba is 13 years old and to highlight the actions of five European states in permitting the detention centres on their territory, Ms Kaur pointed out.
She said Amnesty was calling on the Government to "stop acting in complicity with the US administration" by permitting use of Shannon as a stopover for "rendition" flights.