Last Monday (March 8th) The Examiner reported that there have been nine instances of US troops stopping overnight at Shannon Airport with around one military flight per day landing this year. The newspaper reported that in response to a question from Paul Murphy TD, the Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney confirmed that between 1 January and 17 February 2021, diplomatic clearance was provided for landings of 44 foreign military aircraft in Ireland.

Catherine Connolly TD asked the Minister for the number of permits granted for military aircraft to land at Shannon Airport and to pass through Irish airspace last November, December and January.  

Here's what she was told about Shannon landings:

And here's the information she got about permissions granted for military overflights

This looks like a surprisingly low number for US military overflights. And here's why: in addition to the US military flights that request permission to go through Irish airspace, the US provides additional "post-hoc notifications" of a whole lot more overflights. After the flights had taken place, it told that the Department of Foreign Affairs that there were in fact 41 overflights in November, 45 in December and 31 in January.

This is all covered by the terms of a "1959 arrangement" according to Simon Coveney. Nobody has ever seen that arrangement. We've asked about it before, and Catherine Connolly TD has asked again. We'll wait to see what the Minister says.

Meanwhile John Brady TD, Sinn Féin Spokesperson for Foreign Affairs and Defence asked the the Minister  for the times that some specific US milirary aircraft of interest to us landed at Shannon on 11 January and 23 January. He also asked for the times that the aircraft departed, and the identity of the aircraft, including the registration number.

Here's what the Minister said:

"As Minister for Foreign Affairs, I am responsible for diplomatic clearance for overflights and landings by foreign military aircraft, on the basis of applications made by accredited Embassies of the countries concerned. It is not the policy of my Department to disclose the details of requests for diplomatic clearances, as such information is provided by Embassies in the expectation of the maintenance of confidence. The precise arrangements for arrivals and departures of aircraft are a matter for the aviation authorities, in the same way as for civil aircraft. My Department has no role with regard to that aspect."

Or to attempt to paraphrase: I'm not telling you because the US Embassy wouldn't like it if we did.

John also asked the Minister to outline the mechanisms that will be put in place to ensure that United States military personnel who may be passing through Shannon Airport will be briefed on the Government health guidelines in relation to overseas travel.

The Minister said that the Department of Foreign Affairs "writes to all Embassies ... to inform them of changes to public health requirements impacting on their work, including landings of foreign military aircraft. In addition" And he claimed that he AND his officials have had "extensive discussions" with the US authorities.

He also said

"I and my officials have emphasised to US authorities that crew and passengers of military flights are bound to observe public health regulations in exactly the same way as those on civilian flights. The US authorities have given assurances that they are communicating across their system to ensure that Irish public health requirements are met."

Communicating "across the system", while reminding the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Minister that they were to provide no information about specific US military flights to anyone, including other members of parliament.

Cian O'Callaghan TD, Social Democrats, fared even worse when he asked the same Minister for details of the hotel in which the crew and passengers of a US military flight stayed overnight. It was one of the flights that we identified as having breached the Covid-19 regulations, and both Cian and us are concerned at the lack of investigation into the repeated breaches of regulations.

The Ceann Comhairle intervened to say Cian wasn't allowed to ask that question.

The Ceann Comhairle went on to say that the Minister has "no official responsibility to Dail Eireann for this matter under Standing Order 44". And he added that it "is an operational matter for the Garda Commissioner."

Perhaps we should take encouragement from the suggestion that the Gardai are looking into the matter. But we're not holding our breadth for a full and open report of the US military breaches of our Covid-19 regulations.

In answer to another recent parliamentary question from Cian O'Callaghan, Simon Coveney said he "has no role in the accommodation arrangements for US military personnel on such stopovers".

That may be the case. But we wish some department would take responsibility for the fact that US troops are coming and going through Shannon Airport, and staying overnight in local hotels, Nobody is monitoring their compliance with Covid-19 regulations.

Once again, the US military are permitted to act with impunity when they mis-use Shannon Airport.

Finally, we now know that there were a total of 84 US military crew rest stopovers between 1 February 2020 and 31 January 2021. But when the Minister was asked for details of those ...

Yes, you guessed it. He wouldn't give any.