Eight people will appear in court this morning on charges arising from a protest outside the Adelaide Hospital, Dublin, on Saturday. Members of the anti-abortion group, Youth Defence, staged a protest at the hospital in response to the Adelaide Hospital Society's submission to the Interdepartmental Working Group on Abortion, published in The Irish Times last Tuesday.
According to the national organiser for Youth Defence, Mr Maurice Colgan, the picket of up to 90 people was initially silent, intended to "voice our disgust at the hospital's intentions."
In particular, the group objected to the society's proposal that, in the event of abortion being legalised in line with the X judgment, it should take place at up to eight weeks' gestation in a number of centres around Ireland, including the new hospital in Tallaght.
The protesters were handing out pictures of "aborted babies", and started to chant "Abortion is murder" at about 2.15 p.m., he said. A number of gardai arrived, and one of them arrested Mr Colgan under the Public Order Act. Then two other gardai began to drag a protester beside him towards a Garda van.
"The guards were being extremely aggressive to people," he said. "They began to grab people indiscriminately. Two girls were hospitalised with concussion, and one was later arrested in hospital and charged in Pearse Street.
"We will be asking Bertie Ahern is it the policy of the Government to arrest members of Youth Defence," he said. "The Government wants to bring abortion to this country. They see Youth Defence as the only opposition. They are trying to get them off the streets."
A Garda spokeswoman said a doctor at the hospital rang gardai with a complaint that the group was causing a disturbance. A sergeant was sent to the scene, and spoke to the protesters about the Public Order Act, "asking them to reduce the noise level". One person was arrested.
Staff and patients were frightened, and 12 patrol cars, each with two gardai, were called, she said. The protesters sat on the road, causing an obstruction. It was decided to remove them from the road and the footpath, an operation which took about five minutes, she said. A total of eight people were arrested.
Asked whether their protest had not distressed patients in the hospital, Mr Colgan said he had rung it up earlier in the week and had been told it was an out-patient hospital. "I know what it's like if you're recovering from an operation, you need peace and quiet."