President Michael D Higgins says UN Security Council failing ‘again and again' as Gaza suffers ‘forced starvation'
Speaking at the National Famine Commemoration in Kilmallock, Co Limerick, today, Mr Higgins said starvation is 'being used as an instrument of war' and that the population of Gaza is being subjected to 'forced starvation'.
He quoted UN Secretary General António Guterres, who said: 'As aid dries up, the floodgates of horror have re-opened... Gaza is a killing field – and civilians are in an endless death loop.'
He said the Irish Government is asking EU member states to work to avoid what will be 'a massive loss of life' in Gaza.
He added that aid trucks carrying vital food, medicine and water are currently blocked at 'three entry points to Gaza', including two Irish aid trucks.
During his speech, Mr Higgins called on the UN General Assembly to act when the Security Council 'fails' to deal with current famines.
'When the Security Council fails us as it does again and again, in responding to what I have been describing as the current conditions, we must return to the exceptional measures that are available to us that I remember discussing at the time of the Iraq war, that are available from the General Assembly,' he said.
"The General Assembly must speak and act if in fact the Security Council refuses to deal with the terrible famines that are now facing us in those parts of the world."
Speaking at the event in Co Limerick, Mr Higgins said the recurrence of famine is 'a great human failure' as he said people in Yemen and Sudan also suffer 'hunger and famine created by conflict'.
He said the collapse humanitarian aid and assistance has left a significantly reduced humanitarian capacity.
He said the Horn of Africa has experienced 'devastating hunger' three times in three decades, adding; 'On each occasion, the world said 'never again' when details of the famine were reported to the United Nations. Yet, each time, famine has returned.'
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He said the world is 'witnessing dangerous breaches and challenges to human rights around the world – be it in the plight of those enduring the horrific consequences of avoidable war and conflict, including food insecurity, the reappearance of old hatreds and the arrival of new forms of the scourges of hatred, racism and intolerance'.
Mr Higgins said National Famine Commemoration Day is a 'a solemn opportunity for the people of this island to reflect on and recall those who perished, the suffering and loss experienced by our Irish people in that cataclysmic period in our history to which we refer to as An Gorta Mór'.
"No other event in our history can be likened to the Great Famine for its immediate tragic impact, or its role in creating a massive increase in desperate and involuntary emigration, cultural loss, increased decline of the Irish language, and a general demoralisation of Irish shared life,' he said.
Over one million people died during the famine and over two million emigrated between 1845 and 1852, with a commemoration event today featuring a wreath-laying ceremony and other tributes to those who died.
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