General News

NOBEL PEACE LAUREATE MAIREAD MAGUIRE "HARRASSED" AT HOUSTON AIRPORT

Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire was detained for two hours at Houston Airport on May 14 and questioned about her protests against the Afghanistan invasion and Iraq war. In a statement issued after her release, Ms Maguire denounced her treatment as โ€œunacceptableโ€ and called on President Barack Obama to implement his promises for change. She said, "I am most disappointed at this harassment, which I believe is because I do not remain silent on USA foreign policies, which I believe to be causing a great deal of suffering around the world."

The incident and Ms Maguire's statement was published on the website of the Nobel Women's Initiative, but went largely unreported in the mainstream media. It has since been making the rounds of the global anti-war movements, especially those seeking accountability of U.S. foreign policy and security concerns that have arisen as a result of the โ€œwar on terror.โ€ Under the former Bush administration, many of these heavy-handed tactics were felt to be directly responsible for the declining image of, and fall in visitor arrivals to, the United States.

According to the website report, Ms Maguire was detained on Thursday 14 May, 2009, by Homeland Security Immigration when she was returning home to Northern Ireland, after attending the Nobel Womens' Initiative Conference in Guatemala, hosted by herself and three other women Nobel Peace Laureates, Rigoberta Menchu, Jody Williams, and Shirin Ebadi, and attended by 150 women activists from around the world. Said the report, โ€œMaguire was held for two hours, during which she was questioned, fingerprinted, photographed and questioned again. This resulted in her missing her flight. She was released upon the actions of the Nobel Women's Initiatives representatives' who insisted on her immediate release.โ€

Upon her release, Ms Maguire minced no words in issuing a strong statement of denunciation which can be read in full http://www.nobelwomensinitiative.org/news/article/nobel-laureate-detained-by-usa-homeland-security". For further information about Ms Maguire's work and why her activities are attracting the interest of the U.S. government, please read from http://www.peacepeople.com.

It is perhaps noteworthy that such detentions, which many civil liberties and advocacy groups are referring to as โ€œdiscriminatoryโ€ and โ€œracial profilingโ€, continue to be totally ignored by international travel industry associations, none of which seem to have no desire to press governments for a check-and-balance mechanism. Many more troublesome issues lurk behind the scenes, such as the fate of information provided for visa applications and their potential misuse by government agencies. Travel Impact Newswire will continue to report these flagrant violations of the democratic right to the freedom of travel.

One day, this trickle of violations will become a flood and then a full-scale tsunami, which is probably when our somnambulist industry leaders will wake up and take notice.

Additional Information

Country: United States of America
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Source: TRAVEL IMPACT NEWSWIRE โ€“ Edition 29 (2009) โ€“ Thursday, 28 May 2009
When: 02/6/2009

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