Military Neutrality Dail Éireann — 2023-03-23 ============================================================ Gino Kenny (PBP), Dublin Mid-West I disagree again. Prior to the Minister stepping down as Taoiseach before Christmas, he went to the Council of the European Union and one of the main issues there was strengthening security and defence. All the evidence points towards the development of a European army when it comes to Ireland's neutrality and its place in the world, which has deep respect across the international community. We have said many times that the evidence points to PESCO and participation in European battle groups eroding our neutrality and that is what is at stake. Soundings from the Minister and other Ministers in the Government have shown that. They have stated that the triple lock mechanism is also up for grabs. The evidence is there. Again, this is not me being paranoid. The evidence is there that our role as a neutral country is under threat. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2023-03-23/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:51:43+00:00 Sitting date: 2023-03-23