Latest news with #Tuam
CNN
2 days ago
- Politics
- CNN
Ukraine sees first major anti-government protests since start of war
Ukraine sees first major anti-government protests since start of war Hundreds took to the streets after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a new law limiting the autonomy of anti-corruption agencies in his government. 01:03 - Source: CNN Small Irish town confronts its dark past Excavations of the remains of nearly 800 babies have begun at a former so-called mother and baby home in Tuam, Ireland. At least 9,000 infants and children died in more than a dozen of these institutions over the course of eight decades. 02:11 - Source: CNN Fire tornado rips through Turkish forest Turkey's forestry ministry has released video of a fire tornado tearing through the country's woodland. Hundreds of wildfires have gripped Turkey this summer, as well as Greece and other Mediterranean countries. 00:33 - Source: CNN Concerns grow over Australia's toxic algae bloom A harmful algae bloom off the coast of South Australia, caused by high sea temperatures and runoff from flooding, is poisoning marine life and depleting oxygen in the water. The Australian government has stated that there is little that can be done to reverse the rapid rate of the climate crisis. 01:10 - Source: CNN International visitors to US will pay new fee CNN's Richard Quest explains how the Trump administration enacted a bill that will require international visitors to pay a new 'visa integrity fee' of $250 dollars. The fee will apply to all visitors who are required to obtain nonimmigrant visas to enter the US. 01:36 - Source: CNN Mexico City residents furious over gentrification Mexico City saw its second anti-gentrification protest in less than a month on Sunday with demonstrators furious over rising prices in the city and the record number of foreigners applying for a resident visa. The main nationality of those foreigners seeking to move legally to the nation's capital? The United States of America. 01:11 - Source: CNN Child flees Israeli strike on Gaza refugee camp Video shows a child running away as Israeli munitions struck near a UNRWA school in Bureij Refugee Camp behind her. 00:36 - Source: CNN China cracks down on fake "Lafufu" Labubus Fake Labubu plush toys, dubbed "Lafufu," have gained popularity due to shortages of the original dolls made by China's Pop Mart. 02:05 - Source: CNN Jair Bolsonaro denies coup charges as police raid home Police in Brazil raided the home of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and enforced a ruling from the country's Supreme Court that Bolsonaro wear an electronic ankle tag. Bolsonaro is being accused of plotting to overturn the results of the 2022 presidential election. 01:17 - Source: CNN Taiwan conducts 10-day military drill The Taiwanese government is preparing for a war they hope will never happen. For the first time this year, Taiwan combined two major civil defense exercises, with the drills lasting ten days. These drills have included urban combat, mass casualty simulations, emergency supply drops and cyber defense that could be enacted if an invasion was to occur. CNN's Senior International Correspondent, Will Ripley, reports. 01:44 - Source: CNN Deadly flooding grips South Korea for days South Korea has been ravaged for days by intense flooding that's left more than a dozen people dead. Reuters reported more than 16 inches of rain fell in one area in just 24 hours, citing the country's Interior and Safety Ministry. 00:48 - Source: CNN Brazil's Lula tells Christiane Amanpour: Trump 'Was not elected to be emperor of the world' Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva tells CNN's Christiane Amanpour in an exclusive interview it was 'a surprise' to see President Donald Trump's letter posted to Truth Social, threatening Brazil with a crippling tariff of 50% starting August 1st. Lula says that he initially thought the letter was 'fake news.' Watch the full 'Amanpour' interview on CNN. 01:33 - Source: CNN Gaza's only Catholic church hit by Israeli strike Gaza's only Catholic church was struck by an Israeli tank, killing three and injuring many more, church officials said. It became internationally recognized after reports emerged that the late Pope Francis used to call the church daily. CNN's Nada Bashir reports 00:53 - Source: CNN Prince Harry recreates his mother's historic landmine walk Following in his mother's footsteps, Prince Harry visited Angola's minefields just as Princess Diana did 28 years ago. The Duke of Sussex was in Angola with The Halo Trust as part of the group's efforts to clear landmines. 00:39 - Source: CNN Massive fire destroys Tomorrowland's main stage Tomorrowland's main stage went up in flames just days ahead of the festival's opening in Boom, Belgium. 00:38 - Source: CNN How Trump's image is changing inside Russia Once hailed as a pro-Kremlin figure, President Donald Trump's image is changing inside Russia. It comes after Trump vowed further sanctions on the country if a peace agreement with Ukraine is not reached in 50 days. CNN's Chief Global Affairs Correspondent is on the ground in Moscow with the analysis. 01:41 - Source: CNN Who are the armed groups clashing in Syria? Dozens were killed in Syria this week after clashes between government loyalists and Druze militias in the southern city of Suwayda, prompting Syrian forces to intervene. That, in turn, triggered renewed Israeli airstrikes. 01:57 - Source: CNN Syrian anchor takes cover from airstrike live on TV An airstrike on the Syrian Ministry of Defense was captured live on Syria TV, forcing the anchor to take cover. Israel has been carrying out airstrikes on Syria as part of its commitment to protect the Druze, an Arab minority at the center of clashes with government loyalists. 00:30 - Source: CNN
RTÉ News
3 days ago
- Business
- RTÉ News
Govt to discuss checks on legal challenges to planning decisions
Businesses and individuals bringing legal challenges to planning decisions will face additional restrictions under changes being discussed at Cabinet today. Minister for Housing James Browne is reforming the area of judicial reviews in Irish planning amid Government frustration at delays in securing permission for large housing developments. It is understood that the "leave to apply" stage of the judicial review will be removed as it is believed this is not functioning properly as a screening measure for valid cases. The aim of the change is to save time and costs. In addition, all applicants must provide evidence of sufficient grounds and sufficient interest. The protected status of environmental NGOs to take judicial review proceedings is maintained. Greater limits will also be put on the number of amended grounds applicants may add to their judicial reviews. The new rules will only apply to decisions made under the Planning and Development Act of 2024. The section of the Act relating to judicial reviews will come into force on 1 August 2025. Separately, Mr Browne will bring a memo to Cabinet providing for nearly €74m funding for rural community water schemes. This will fund 291 projects nationwide, covering 63,000 households. The Cabinet will also hear that the Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill will defer the introduction of health warnings on alcohol labels for two years. This is due to concerns raised about the impact of the move in the current global trading environment. The labeling requirement was due to come in next year but it is expected to be deferred until 2028. Meanwhile, Minister for Children, Disability and Equality Norma Foley will bring a memo to Cabinet to bring the Tuam intervention office under the indemnity of State Claims Agency. This will allow the State Claims Agency to handle any potential claims in relation to the Office of the Director of Authorised Intervention, Tuam. Minister for Enterprise Peter Burke will bring an action plan on market diversification for Irish exporters threatened by tariffs.
Irish Times
4 days ago
- Business
- Irish Times
State agencies to implement new rules aiming to enhance transparency in political ads
Plans are in train for various State agencies to take charge of new rules to improve transparency around misinformation in political advertising. Minister for Housing James Browne , whose department oversees policy around elections, will update Cabinet Ministers on the implementation of new European Union regulations that will affect political advertising published after next October 10th. While final decisions are still to be made on which State body will take responsibility for each specific aspect, a Coalition source indicated Coimisiún na Meán would be a 'natural fit' for online material. Consideration is also being given as to which agency would be best placed to police offline material such as election posters. READ MORE The new rules aim to make it easier for voters to recognise political advertisements, understand who is behind them and to know if they have received a targeted advertisement. Mr Browne will also brief the Cabinet on plans to provide €73.9 million for rural community water schemes, of which there are about 750 across State supplying 125,000 homes. The multiannual rural water programme will support 291 projects that supply 63,000 homes not served by national water utility Uisce Éireann . Meanwhile, Minister for Children Norma Foley will brief the Cabinet on plans to bring the Tuam intervention office under the indemnity of the State Claims Agency (SCA). This step will allow the SCA to handle any potential claims against the office and is standard practice for newly-established public bodies. The office is charged with recovering, where possible identifying, and reburying remains of children inappropriately buried at the site of the former mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway. On tariffs and trade, Minister for Enterprise Peter Burke will bring an action plan on market diversification to the Cabinet today. A key part of the Government's plan to respond to the looming threat of tariffs is to find new valuable markets and supply chains for Irish exporters. Mr Burke will formally launch this next month alongside Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade Simon Harris . Mr Harris will today tell Ministers the EU will 'intensify' negotiating efforts with the US ahead of the August 1st deadline for trade talks. Ministers will also hear that Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill will defer the introduction of health warnings on alcohol labels by two years, amid concerns that the labels could make Ireland less competitive internationally. The mandatory health labels had been due to be brought in next year. Last week it was reported that the proposal would be delayed until 2029. They have now been deferred for two years rather than three to 2028. Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries Martin Heydon will bring forward a memo on behalf of Minister for State Timmy Dooley seeking to ban industrial trawlers from fishing within six nautical miles of the Irish coast. Such a measure had previously been attempted in 2019, but was subsequently overturned in a case taken by two fishermen in 2023. The ban, which will apply to trawlers above 18m, is part of a plan to make inland fishing more sustainable and fairer for smaller fishermen. The ban is expected to face legal challenge, though it is understood the Government believes its legal position is 'robust'. Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary will give an update on the report of the registrar general which shows a 1.1 per cent decrease in births, a 0.2 per cent increase in deaths and a 3.8 per cent decrease in marriages.
Irish Examiner
4 days ago
- Politics
- Irish Examiner
Fergus Finlay: Abuse and complicity of Tuam never seems to end
Do you know that great anti-war song, 'The Green Fields of France', with its closing line, 'The killing and dying were all done in vain, for young Willie McBride, it all happened again and again and again and again and again …' That's Tuam. It's abuse and complicity. It never seems to end. I've written before about Tuam. I've written about Eamonn Casey and Micheal Cleary. It's still impossible to approach any of those subjects without an overwhelming sensation of anger and shame. I first wrote about Tuam years ago. And I can still remember tossing and turning for nights after it was all revealed. This is exclusive subscriber content. Already a subscriber? Sign in Take us with you this summer. Annual €130€65 Best value Monthly €12€6 / month
The Guardian
17-07-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Why has it taken a decade to exhume the bodies of the 800 dead babies of Tuam?
A young girl played on a swing near a mass grave as the names of hundreds of children who died in a mother-and-baby institution in Ireland were read out during a memorial service late last year. The bright day turned to dark in the time it took. Now, the playground near the site in Tuam has been dismantled and the long-awaited exhumation has begun. But why has it taken more than a decade since it emerged that those dead children were likely buried in sewage chambers on the grounds of a publicly funded institution run by nuns and the local council? A technical drawing from the 1970s of the council housing estate built on the grounds showed 'old children's burial ground' written directly above 'proposed playground'. Local authorities knew long ago. News first broke in 2014 after Catherine Corless, who was working on a history project, tracked down death certificates for nearly 800 children for whom there were almost no burial records. She had gone to the Bon Secours Sisters, the Catholic organisation that ran the home, to the local bishop and the authorities. Little was done until she went to the media. It is a vindication of Corless's work that the exhumation is taking place, but also disturbing that it was never a certainty. I had already started writing a book about survivors of Ireland's institutions for 'unmarried mothers' when a test excavation publicly confirmed 'significant human remains' at Tuam, dating to the time the nuns ran the home, between 1925 and 1961. In 2018, the public was asked what should be done. I keep thinking of the 'talking stone', a lump of grey felt handed around a public meeting organised by Galway county council, which owned the site, in a Tuam hotel. We were asked to hold it and say what we wanted to happen about a mass grave of babies. Options ranged from memorialisation alone to the full forensic excavation happening today. While it was important to talk about it, it also felt surreal and even wrong, with some people asking why the site was not being treated as any other crime scene. One man described Tuam as 'ground zero' and begged: 'Dig those bodies up, every one of them, all over the country. Give the children some dignity.' Even if one family was able to get an answer, it was worth it. A woman from the housing estate pointed out that she had 'no right to tell a survivor you cannot identify where your brother or sister is' and hoped the children would not be left 'in a cesspit with just a plaque'. It was survivors, families and all those who wanted the truth for them who fought relentlessly against an ongoing silence from church and state. It was activists such as Izzy Kamikaze, who found an old map showing cesspools in the grounds that were known locally to have included a burial site. Bones had been found sporadically down the years. As the former Irish president Mary McAleese said about systemic abuse: 'We heard it through the media, we heard it through the courage of victims, we heard it through lawyers, we heard it through government. We never really heard it openly, spontaneously from our church.' I would say we never heard it first from those in power either, even when, in the case of the Tuam children, they had access to the information long before, from earlier investigations. At a council meeting in the 1960s, an influential politician argued against the impending closure of Tuam, saying, 'The county has the benefit of the money spent there.' I reported how a Tuam survivor fostered by the same politician spoke of abuse and exploitation for labour. She died before seeing any justice. 'Our Lord was crucified and so were the women of this country,' PJ Haverty, a Tuam survivor who first took me to the burial site, told me. 'The nuns had power, it was all about money and it was all about power.' His mother had gone to the nuns day after day trying to get her baby back. Tuam was just one in a system of institutions that operated until as recently as 2006, where unmarried pregnant women were sent to give birth, were effectively incarcerated and, in many cases, were forcibly separated from their children: more than 50,000 mothers and more than 50,000 children. A commission of investigation, forced by the news of Tuam, began in 2015 and concluded in 2021, finding that 9,000 children had died in these 'homes'. But it called the institutions 'refuges' and dismissed survivor testimonies about the inhumanity and abuses. The official redress scheme now excludes thousands of survivors, seemingly to cut costs. In 2018, during the government press conference announcing the decision to excavate, I was told by the then children's minister Katherine Zappone that Tuam could set a precedent for other institutions. There are many families still searching for answers. There are also mass graves on the grounds of similar institutions in the UK, the US and Canada. The crimes of the Catholic church are global. At the memorial last year, Tuam survivor Peter Mulryan told me he didn't want to sign the legal waiver required for redress, under which recipients agree not to take any further action against the state about their experience, so preventing any legal justice, describing it as 'another insult to survivors'. But, at 81, he felt he had no choice and is happy others are taking the case to court. Mulryan was one of many Tuam children 'boarded out' to a farm, and he told me he was brutally exploited there, with no justice or redress. His mother was sent to the Galway Magdalene laundry for the rest of her life. Corless found a sister he never knew about, who had died at Tuam. He has spoken out for most of a decade, hoping to find her. Religious sisters did speak to me for my book, but were often silenced by superiors or after legal advice. Meanwhile, voices from within the religious right, including the president of the Catholic League in the US, have called Tuam 'a hoax', in a country where reproductive rights are rolled back and Catholic hospitals have increasing influence. The Bon Secours order is part of an international healthcare conglomerate worth billions in the US. Terry Prone, whose PR firm acted for the Bon Secours Sisters, wrote a now infamous email when the news first broke, calling it the 'O my God – mass grave in West of Ireland' story and warning a French TV journalist: 'You'll find no mass grave, no evidence that children were ever so buried.' At a reading of my book, a man repeated the hoax claim, even after public photos from the test excavation showed the slits in a huge tank, making any proper burial impossible, the blurred photos of infant bones inside, and a baby's blue shoe. Despite this, religious and political conservatives in Ireland, rallying against recent progressive changes, have even argued for bringing back such institutions. From the earliest years, the state knew that 'illegitimate' children in these institutions were dying at sometimes five times the rate of children born within marriage. Death certificates show children dying of malnutrition, or marked as 'imbecile', one boy convulsing for 12 hours before dying. The children's lives were not valued. I think of Julia Devaney, a domestic worker in Tuam, who described it in taped interviews as barracks-like, smelling of the wet beds of frightened and deprived children, while nuns treated officials from local authorities to lavish dinners on the grounds. Devaney said a nun who worked there left the Bon Secours because of what she saw. 'They knew well that the home was a queer place, 'twas a rotten place,' said Devaney. 'I feel a sense of shame that I did not create a war.' Survivors are still fighting their long battle for truth and justice, hoping similar injustices will never be repeated. I believe that even today church and state perpetuate the silences and inequalities that led to a mass grave of children. This excavation can be a reckoning, a reminder to those in power to listen to those who are owed real accountability: the survivors and the families of the many children who can no longer speak. Caelainn Hogan is an Irish journalist and the author of Republic of Shame
