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WAC   ~ World Archaeological Congress

 

 World Archaeological Congress meeting in Dublin ~

 

 

the 6th World Archaeological Congress - held this year in Dublin

 

 


Press Release on behalf of the Tara Solidarity Vigil Camp
1st July 2008

It is a very strange world we live in.
While the Government is funding the destruction of our Culture and Heritage in the Tara Valley, Ireland is hosting the 6th World Archaeological Congress (WAC) 2008 , being held at U.C. D, of which President Mary McAleese is a patron (http://www.ucd.ie/wac-6/index.html)
As the worlds Archaeologists convene in Dublin, another National  Monument draws even closer to destruction at Lismullen, in the Tara  Valley.

The Souterrain (GPS ME032:021) is closer to the construction work than had been expected, and is in serious threat of damage due to the close proximity of the heavy machinery. The exclusion zone around this monument is estimated at over 143m less than had been planned . Donald Murphy of the Archaeological company A.C.S. working on the section has been reported to have voiced that it is only 7m
now from the physical road.
The World Archaeological Congress (WAC) is the only representative, fully international organization of practicing archaeologists.
Founded in 1986, WAC encourages open dialogue among all people genuinely concerned about the past, including scholars from under-represented parts of the world, First Nations people, and descendent communities whose pasts are told by archaeologists. One of WAC's primary functions is to hold an international congress every four to five years to offer discussion of new archaeological research as well as archaeological policy, practice and politics. Previous congresses were held in the United States, South Africa, India, Venezuela and
England.

Ireland has the honour of hosting the SIXTH WORLD ARCHAEOLOGICAL CONGRESS, to be held in Dublin.
How ironic, when we are systematically destroying our Archaeological landscape to replace it with motorways in the same week that hundreds of international Archeologists will visit Tara, that leading Archaeologist Jo Ronayne, employed by the NRA subcontractor A.C.S. to survey the M3 Tara valley route has been reported to have claimed her findings were changed to weight support towards the final route,
when in-fact there was allegedly evidence against it (Irish Mail on Sunday, 29Jun2008).


When the M3 motorway was been planned it was a time of affluence in Ireland but now with recession looming it's time to re-visit the financial cost to tax payer of this expensive project.
The Tara Solidarity Vigil calls on the people of Ireland to come and meet the WAC representatives who are taking a tour of Tara on Wednesday, 2nd July'08. Please come and ask them to add their voices and support to the call on the Government to look at sustainable and viable alternatives to the proposed M3 and take serious alternative solutions like the Meath Master Plan. People will be congregating at the car park from 10am to welcome the group to the Hill of Tara.

Yesterday I posted the press release above under some rush/pressure as doing it from work so I made the mistake of stating GPS, when  apparently it should have been RMP....(sorry).

Also, I managed to drop out the following to the Vigil for some light entertainment today to greet the WAC visitors and hopefully something that the photographers about might take a picture of:
8 T-Shirts that have the words Operation Bedrock with the image of the Flintstone Family out in the car with the road sign saying "2nd hand graves for sale".
1 Fred Flintstone dress up costume
1 Wilma Flintstone dress up costume

Word back from the Hill by text, from Emma is: "We are like guardians of Tara. Conor Newman was great, he invited us to mix and chant and hand out flyers. The atmosphere brill,iant, no agro. Will text more later, on tour with them". I'll update as messages come in so people can keep up with how it's going out there.....

J

 

Report from the WAC Conference - AMAZINg report from Emma !

posted by Carmel to the Savetara yahoo group - Sun Jul 6, 2008 12:23 am

 

Hi all,

Yesterday plenary session WAC

. We, that is Maggie Ronane, Debbie, Emily, Lou, Dublin Robert and myself all managed to get into the plenary session.
Debbie and Maggie and myself had made submissions to the congress. On each of our submissions, the congress, which was 1800 archaeologists from 75 countries kept saying they didn't know enough about Tara to vote; so there were a lot of abstentions, which meant none of our submissions carried.
However,  one woman who was from America or somewhere like that, though she did have a very  foreign name, she stood up and said she was not happy that the congress were  not given any information on Tara. she demanded that she be allowed to make a  submission(and this is rough at the moment) something to do with alternatives  to M3 be investigated. I'd made a submission for alternatives to M3 and gave  as an example of an aesthetic, sustainable and environmentally friendly  alternative in the Meath Master Plan Project. I had attached a flyer, an a4 size colour of the MMP with all the advantages etc on it. This flyer was not presented with my submission, I asked the chair person why it wasn't, especially when so many present abstained from voting because there was no information made available to them about Tara. The chair person said he did not see my flyer with my submission. Maggie stood up and re-assured him I had stapled my flyer  to my written submission. At that there was a bit of toing and frowing. The  president of WAC, Clair Smith said the information wasn't available on Tara because Tara was on the agenda then off then on again. She Clair Smith then asked me  for a flyer.
I gave her a half dozen. She then announced that the situation  regarding Tara would be discussed at an assembly when the plenary was over. The woman with the American accent then said it was not good enough and she insisted she be allowed to make a submission on having the entire m3 investigated by WAC.
Her submission was voted on and the entire hall showed a vote in favour.
To say we hijacked the plenary would be an understatement. the packed hall listened about Tara for over one hour. Of the 20 submissions made to the plenary Tara was the only one that had five. All the other countries had one and there was nothing to object to in any of them so they went through with big show of
hands. But not Tara. we made our presence very felt. Just to give you idea on our submissions.
Maggie submitted on how archaeologists working on M3 were harassed their reports distorted/doctored and in effect the archaeologists were intimidated.
Debbie submitted on the bones of the ancestors been put in black plastic bags and into ware houses
Maggie submitted on the Henge and the sutarian in Lismullan woods.
However she asked the chair if Debbie could talk about it; she explained she had written the submission before Debbie arrived but she felt Debbie as a campaigner had better knowledge about both the Henge and the sutrain. so Debbie gave brilliant talk about both.
Then I submitted on alternatives to m3 and gave example of alternative as MMP.
By the time we had finished with Tara which was the longest and most hotly argued by Mary Deevy. Well she didn't hotly argue. She tried but we had answers for her. She didn't even try to defend her stand on the M3 route when alternatives were been discussed. she sat dead quiet.
so it was another brilliant day for Tara.
I'll be writing to Clair Smith on how information on Tara was not made available to the Archaeologists hence our submissions were not voted for or against but abstentions because of lack of information.
So looks like WAC is going to investigate Tara.

To make sure they  don't take too long I'll be hounding Clair Smith to find things out.
Will write up better and more when I meet with Debbie and Emily and lu and Robert to make notes on our the wac plenary. Also think Maggie is going to complain about Archaeologists not been informed about the M3. so it  starts here
Emma

Sun Jul 6, 2008 12:23 am