Shell’s Private Army?

At approximately 4.00am on 16 April this year the Hotel Las Americas in Santa Cruz in eastern Bolivia shook with the sound of machinegun fire. Bolivian armed police stormed five adjoining rooms and shot dead three of the occupants while arresting two others. The Bolivian government subsequently announced that they had foiled a cell of right-wing mercenaries who were plotting to assassinate Bolivia’s Socialist President Evo Morales.

In room 457 lay the slain body of Irishman Michael Dwyer, a 24 year old from Balinderry, Tipperary. According to reports, Dwyer was fascinated by guns, computer war games and was an Airsoft enthusiast; a form of mock combat with replica guns. Several photographs of him brandishing guns in Bolivia have since been published. He was also employed by an Irish company, Integrated Risk Management Security, who are based in Naas, Kildare. I-RMS is owned by former Irish Army Rangers James Farrell and Terry Downes. They confirmed that Dwyer worked for them up until October 2008, and was based guarding the Corrib site in Glengad, County Mayo where Shell are attempting to construct their controversial gas pipeline.

At the end of 2007 I-RMS ‘security operatives’ replaced the majority of security guards employed by Shell. A substantial number of these ‘operatives’ have military backgrounds and dubious far-right political links. I-RMS have faced numerous complaints from protestors, having been accused of assault, heavy handedness and failure to wear or present their Private Security Authority licences. They have also routinely filmed protestors and indeed Dwyer himself was involved in this gathering of intelligence for Shell. On their website, offline and ‘under construction’ in the wake of Dwyer’s death, I-RMS had advertised their services, specialising in “international armed and unarmed security”, “customised security solutions” and “special services”, unquestionably all euphemisms for mercenary work. I-RMS have also been used by Fianna Fáil at their last few ardfheiseanna. So not only does I-RMS protect the nefarious multinational Shell in their robbery of Irish gas, they also defend the politicians who facilitated this grand theft. Who said three’s a crowd? Maura Harrington, the courageous veteran Shell to Sea campaigner, castigated I-RMS as “Shell’s private army in North Mayo”. This hired muscle for capitalism has been doing the state’s dirty work, while Gardaí turn a blind eye. They are no more than a hired gang of thugs and fascists.

Dwyer originally left Ireland in November 2008 on the pretext of doing a three month security course in Bolivia, a course that never was. He originally travelled with two Hungarians and a Pole. It is thought that he met Eduardo Rósza Flores, the leader of the mercenary cell who was also shot dead, through their mutual friend Tibor Révész, who is believed to be still resident in Ireland. Révész is the leader of the Szekler Legion, a Hungarian organisation that openly promotes neo-nazism and race hate. The other members of the Bolivian mercenary cell were Árpád Magyarosi, who was shot dead, and Elod Tóásó, who was arrested. Both were members of Révész’s Legion. On its website it sells patches emblazoned with a skull surrounded by a Celtic design associated with defending the Corrib project relating to Operation Solitaire Shield. The Solitaire is the name of the ship used for pipe-laying at sea. It has also advertised I-RMS courses. I-RMS have refused to comment on whether they had or are employing international right-wing fascists as security guards for Shell. Over a third of the 22,037 people licensed as private security guards have not undergone any form of Garda background checks and Sinn Féin’s Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Aengus Ó Snodaigh, has already demanded “an urgent investigation into what these extremists have been doing in Mayo and whether proper security checks have been followed”.

While the general Irish media have portrayed Dwyer as innocent, naïve and non-political, sinister details have been emerging ever since. While the 24 year old was in Glengad he met and befriended eastern Europeans with fascist links. Eventually he met up with Eduardo Rósza Flores in Santa Cruz. 49 year old Flores had a chequered past to say the least. He fought in the Balkan conflict in the 1990s with Croatian paramilitary troops as part of the notorious Zenga unit that took part in the ethnic cleansing of Serbs. He was a fascist mercenary, anti-communist (although he was a former leader of the Hungarian Communist Party’s youth wing), anti-semitic (though part-Jewish), a recent convert to Islam, who mixed left-wing ideals with racial and cultural separation. He seemed as politically indecisive as Senator Eoin Harris. Flores, born in Bolivia but grew up in Hungary, returned to Santa Cruz, (the eastern region in Bolivia rich in natural resources) illegally, in his own words to “organise the defence of the city and province”, and to do it not by marching with flags, but to “do it with arms”. According to Bolivian Vice-President Álvaro García Linera “Rózsa was in the country to recruit and train paramilitaries to destabilise the country”.

Bolivia’s Socialist President Evo Morales has nationalised his country’s abundant natural gas resources much to the consternation of Shell. While the multinational will face imminent court hearings in the US over the deaths of nine Nigerian activists in 1995, their mercenaries and state forces continue to be mired in deep controversy throughout the world. Is Shell’s insatiable avarice to pilfer natural resources at whatever cost the common denominator here?

The rise of the Right must be resisted

LAST WEEKEND, people throughout the 27 EU member states cast their votes to elect 736 Members of the European Parliament.

Turn-out was a paltry 43%, the lowest in the three decades of European voting. Voter apathy was widespread with over half of the electorate choosing to stay at home, politically apathetic due to ubiquitous corruption scandals, democratic deficits and failing to see a real political alternative in their respective countries. In some eastern European countries, turn-out languished around the 20% mark. Despite the fact that the European Union is responsible for 80% of member states’ legislation, to voters the EU seems distant and not worthwhile, a suspicious unelected bureaucratic monster for many with its mysterious yet powerful Commission. There was only one victor in these European elections, and it certainly was not the Left. Conservative and far-right parties enjoyed electoral success and subsequent seat gains.

Martin Schulz, German MEP and leader of the Party of European Socialists group, admitted: “Overall, this is a very bitter evening for us.” The centre-right consolidated its power whilst the xenophobic far-right made worrying forays into the political mainstream. With the scapegoating of immigrants for society’s ills, the far-right appealed to a substantial number of voters, some for different reasons.

The British National Party (BNP), heirs of the neo-nazi National Front, won two European Parliament seats. Veteran racist and former National Socialist Movement and National Front member Andrew Brons was elected for Yorkshire and Humber with the BNP polling nearly 10% there. Their leader, Nick Griffin, pelted by eggs on Tuesday by anti-fascist protesters at an aborted BNP press conference at Westminster, won a North-West seat with 8% of the vote, an increase from last time out. This is a party that refuses membership to black people and has stated that “Britain is full up” and immigrants should be ‘sent back’. The BNP actually secured fewer votes than last time out but gained two seats – its first ever – because of the low turn-out for the other parties, particularly Labour. It is the Labour Party’s worst election since 1918.

FRACTURED LEFT
In France, Prime Minister Nicolas Sarkozy and his conservative UMP convincingly defeated a fractured left that is in disarray. In neighbouring Spain, the ruling socialist PSOE were beaten into second place by the centre-right Partido Popular.
In Italy, although controversial leader Silvio Berlusconi’s Freedom Party support dropped slightly, his far-right coalition partners, the xenophobic Northern League, which prides itself on its anti-immigration stance, rose to 10.6%. Italy’s main opposition, the Democratic Party, an eclectic mix containing Christian Democrats and Socialists, nosedived 7%.

The German Social Democrats suffered electoral ignominy with its worst showing since the Second World War. Even the new left German Party, Die Linke (The Left), failed to fulfil prior expectations, polling only 7.5%. In Poland, the governing pro-capitalist Civic Platform party amassed 25 seats, with the homophobic Law and Justice party scooping 15. In the Czech Republic, the centre-right Civic Democrats were successful despite the appallingly low turn-out of below 30%.

The far-right gained considerably in the Netherlands with a return of four MEPs for Geert Wilder’s Freedom Party, criticised for its anti-Islamic nature. Austria’s Freedom Party polled around 13%. In Hungary, the notorious radical, anti-Semitic and neo-fascist Jobbik Party won three seats, almost beating the ruling Socialists, rocked by corruption scandals, who got one more. Fidesz, the main centre-right opposition won 14 of the available 22 seats.

Romania’s far-right Greater Romania Party also increased its vote and in Denmark, running on a nationalist, anti-immigrant and populist platform, the Danish People’s Party got two seats. Glimmers of hope for the Left surfaced only in Greece, Latvia, Malta, Slovakia and Sweden.

PROTEST VOTE OR SINISTER DEVELOPMENT?
So does one take this electoral advent of the far-right as a consequence of a protest vote or is it a more sinister development with fascism being embraced by some as an alternative? Voter apathy is a major problem. The rise of the Right has been possible due to the crisis on and fragmentation of the Left. There are nominal socialist parties throughout Europe who have failed to articulate an alternative to the current capitalist system that is in crisis.

Instead of moving to the centre, these parties should be forging left links, building a mass movement and tackling xenophobia, racism, and sectarianism head-on. We should be countering the Right’s attempts of dividing the working-class along religious, ethnic, national or whatever lines. The sore of fascism will fester only if the Left continues to be its worst enemy and turn on itself. The collective energy of the Left should be aimed at combating and defeating the Right. The EU is once again in the hands of the Right, though not in the right hands. A ratification of the Lisbon Treaty would have major repercussions which such pro-capitalist parties at the European helm.

Four years after the Wall Street Crash and Great Depression, Hitler came to power in Germany. It is the Left’s role to ensure that such a development is never allowed to happen again.