From: kellyc@ul.ie
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Irish President to Host Lesbian and Gay Representatives
Date: 10 Sep 92 21:17:57 GMT
Organization: University of Limerick, Ireland



Feel free to submit this to your local/regional/national LGBO* newspapers 
around the globe. 

I'm going to be cheeky and ask: if your local paper does publish the story 
and you can get around to it, would send me a (hard) copy of the publication 
by `snail' mail, please.

This has also been posted to gaynet.

================

Limerick, Ireland -  8 September 1992

Irish President to Host Lesbian and Gay Representatives 

by Cathal Kelly 

The President of Ireland, Mrs Mary Robinson has invited representatives 
of the lesbian and gay community in Ireland to visit her at her official 
residence in the Phoenix Park, Dublin next December. 

Thirty-four people, representing a range of lesbian and gay organisations 
throughout the country, will visit Aras and Uachtarain - the Presidential 
Palace - on December 12, where Mrs Robinson will host a reception for the 
visitors. 

Among the visitors will be representatives from Lesbian Lines and Gay 
Switchboards in Galway, Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Belfast and Derry; GLEN, 
the Gay and Lesbian Equality Network; the Gay Youth groups in Cork, 
Dublin and Limerick; the National Lesbian and Gay Federation; Gay 
Community News; and members of Parents Enquiry from Dublin and Limerick. 
Senator David Norris of Dublin and Mr Arthur Leahy of Cork will also join 
the representatives at the presidential reception. Both Senator Norris 
and Mr Leahy have been active in organising the Irish lesbian and gay 
community for over fifteen years. They are the only gay people to have 
been awarded the Magnus Hirschfeld Award by the National Lesbian and Gay 
Federation. 

During the visit to the President, the representatives will be given a 
tour of Aras an Uachtarain. This will be followed with a formal meeting 
with Mrs Robinson where a member of each group will be introduced to the 
President. Mrs Robinson will then make a short address to the Irish 
lesbian and gay community through the representatives attending. 

After the formal proceedings Mrs Robinson will host an hour-long informal 
reception where she will meet and talk with the representatives over drinks. 

The Presidency of Ireland is a non-political post and it is not expected 
that Mrs Robinson will make any explicit references to the fact that 
Ireland has still not repealled its laws dating from the nineteenth 
century which criminalise homosexuality. Never the less, the fact that the 
President is formally meeting representatives of the lesbian and gay 
community is seen by many as an important landmark in the development of 
an open society in Ireland. 

In 1977 Senator (then Mr) Norris initiated an civil action against Ireland 
claiming that the laws which prohibited sex between men were a breach of 
his constitutional rights. Prior to being elected President of Ireland in 
1990 Mrs Robinson was a barrister, and she represented Senator Norris in his 
appeal to the Irish Supreme Court. Despite losing his case in the Irish 
courts, Senator Norris won a judgement in the European Court of Human Rights 
in 1988 stating that the laws were a breach of his rights under the European 
Convention of Human Rights.

[note for those printing this: The President prefers to be known 
 as _Mrs_ Robinson, and NOT _Ms_ Robisnon.]



================

Cathal


---------------------------------------------
|     Cathal Kelly                             
|     Ollscoil Luimnigh (Uni. Limerick),    For the benefit of 
|     National Technological Park,          the non-Irish the
| IRL Limerick                              't' in 'Cathal' is       |
|                                           silent and the name      |
      (Ireland)                             is attached to the       |
                                            male of the species.     |
      kellyc@ul.ie                                                   | 
                                --------------------------------------


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