A crowd of about 40 members of the Irish Anti-War Movement protested outside the inaugural meeting of the new City Council at Dublin's City Hall last night.
The protesters were calling for an end to the council's ban on the use of fly posters to advertise anti-war events in the city. As members of the new council took their seats to chants of "City Council hear our say, censorship no way!" a former lord mayor Cllr Dermot Lacey (Lab) said a motion to lift the ban would be tabled at the earliest opportunity.
The anti-war activist Mr Richard Boyd Barrett told protesters the motion would be supported by Sinn Féin on the new council as well as some Independents. Protesters cheered and waved placards calling for "Free speech now" and "Defend the right to protest" as they posed for photographers and walked back and forth at the City Hall.
Mr Boyd Barrett said he hoped "democracy would prevail tonight" and he called on all protesters to come out in the "same huge numbers as you did last year" at a rally against the war in Iraq. The rally is to be held in Parnell Square at 7 p.m. on Friday.
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