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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Aibu to wonder what Russia is up to in Ireland..

463 replies

Chamomiltea · 10/03/2022 21:59

Reading this was a shock, given recent events... www.rte.ie/news/primetime/2022/0310/1285699-russian-embassy-orwell-road-irish-government/

OP posts:
Thread gallery
7
IsFuzzyBeagMise · 11/03/2022 09:59

Source: Wikipedia

Aibu to wonder what Russia is up to in Ireland..
yodaforpresident · 11/03/2022 10:02

I have actually been to Bobby Sands Street in Tehran (about 15 years ago). An interesting country to visit.

LakieLady · 11/03/2022 10:06

@Frazzled50yrold

'P.s. Southern Ireland is generally not considered an acceptable term to refer the the country of Ireland' Considering I live in Northern Ireland I consider Southern Ireland to be a perfectly acceptable term.
Many Irish people find it offensive. It's like calling Pakistan "Northern India".

And if we're talking nations, you live in the United Kingdom, of which NI is just a part.

YerWanIsGettinNotions · 11/03/2022 10:06

@IsFuzzyBeagMise

Source: Wikipedia
That's interesting as it shows the attitude of a public sector British organisation that isn't necessarily the same as the Irish attitude to the name of the country.

I did notice working in the UK public sector that there are political sensitivities about use of "Ireland" and the "Republic of Ireland". In Ireland "the Republic of Ireland" is an "official description" but not the name of the country (Republic of Ireland Act 1948 - Act of the Oireachtas). In the UK, the Republic of Ireland is their official preferred name for the country (Republic of Ireland Act 1949 - Act of Parliament).

Given the timing of those Acts, it was clearly designed as a workaround to let the parties communicate and enter into binding international agreements on eg security, finances, citizenship etc via a term that they could both live with.

LadyEloise1 · 11/03/2022 10:08

"I predict a very special episode of Room To Improve"
You are bold @CliffsofMohair !

Seriously though I can't see the denizens of Orwell Road allowing the name change. - if it affects the price of property there.

Pat Kenny did a brilliant "reply to the Russian Ambassador" on Newstalk. I can't do links perhaps someone could do a link to it ?
Well worth a listen / watch.

cailingaelach · 11/03/2022 10:09

@YerWanIsGettinNotions

Jesus *@DownNative* I've rarely seen so much wrong as everything you've said in your "patiently explaining why Irish people are wrong and you alone have the correct knowledge" manner.

"The name of the State is Éire, or in the English language, Ireland".. doesn't mean "the name of the state is Éire and it's ok to say that if you don't speak English". It's phrased that way around because it's a translation of the law and the Irish language version has supremacy. That means a less literal translation (if it was written with the English language as primary) would say "The name of the State is Ireland and in the Irish language, Éire."

And this is just outrageous:
Using "Ireland" for the southern state was always meant to confuse outsiders, to promote a united Ireland and to act as though the island itself isn't divided into two separate, distinct parts.

It was never "meant to confuse outsiders". That's not how countries select their own names. Ireland has always been Ireland, and the fact of invasion, plantation and occupation didn't change that. It had a name and a national identity of irishness long before Elizabeth I and the plantation of Ulster. Why should a country which has finally reclaimed its independence have to change its own name because partition was the price of home rule? Ireland is no less Ireland just because it had to surrender six counties.

If you take a chunk of Wales in the east and give it over to administration by the government in England, should the rest of Wales lose the right to be called "Wales", so nobody gets confused between Wales and the English county of East Wales?

Exellent post, agree with every word.
JaneJeffer · 11/03/2022 10:09

@SunscreenCentral

I'm shook that Eoghan Murphy, Minister for Absolutely No Housing, Like None actually managed to do ONE useful thing in his political life before he slid back under a rock "moved on" to new pastures
He's not just a pretty face.
cailingaelach · 11/03/2022 10:09

*excellent

ScrambledSmegs · 11/03/2022 10:09

@LadyCordeliaFitzgerald

So what happened between 2015 when the planning permission was granted and 2020?

What has actually been built, or not?

And has there been an investigation into who/why the pp was granted in the first place?

In regard to the Orwell Rd, it falls under two council jurisdictions. On one side street names are decided by plebiscite, the other council decides these things by a committee.

I would like to know the answer to this too. What has Russia built under their embassy in Ireland? In real terms.
DomesticatedZombie · 11/03/2022 10:15

See if you were a spy and doing things in secret, like preparing for armageddon, would you not surely just not bother with planning permission?

DomesticatedZombie · 11/03/2022 10:15

I can imagine the Risk Assessment and Method Statement for Armageddon would be a bugger for paperwork.

LakieLady · 11/03/2022 10:16

@Bellusaurus

Don't be distracted by the Southern Ireland thing. That will be Russian Putin Bots in a Bunker in need of extension on Orwell Road, stirring up dissent on our harmonious Isle. Like they did Brexit ...
GrinGrinGrin
DomesticatedZombie · 11/03/2022 10:16

Roads department would have something to say about the Horsemen, no doubt. Four abreast? On a B road? With scythes?! I think not!

JaneJeffer · 11/03/2022 10:20

I also call Northern Ireland the "northern state" which is what it is just like the ROI is the "southern state".
You're talking out of your arse @DownNative
Why would Russia need bots when some posters have been derailing every thread about Ireland with this type of nonsense for years?

And Dermot wouldn't go near that place. No windows in a bunker.

LakieLady · 11/03/2022 10:25

*I live in County Cork in southern Ireland within the REPUBLIC OF IRELAND.

Maybe you failed geography at school?*

Geography AND history, I reckon. I was taught the history that led up to an independent Ireland at school, in Surrey, hardly a hotbed of radical republicanism.

MargaretBall · 11/03/2022 10:28

In the interest of fairness, the official moniker is the United kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. However , the U.K. of GB and NI officially consents to being referred to as the United Kingdom/U.K. So it is acceptable to use that name. Using GB excludes NI so could be deemed offensive to NI unionists. The use of the British isles or the mainland
is a whole other can of worms that should not be opened 😂

Odd that a thread on Russian activities in sovereign states was derailed with attempts to perpetuate historic animosity and justify misnaming states , if I was a conspiracy theorist I would be checking for ferrero rocher crumbs 😂

SunscreenCentral · 11/03/2022 10:30

😂 @JaneJeffer Dermot won't rest easy until we are all living in glass boxes and with the rain pelting down on us we won't be able to hear ourselves think

JaneJeffer · 11/03/2022 10:33

@SunscreenCentral

😂 *@JaneJeffer* Dermot won't rest easy until we are all living in glass boxes and with the rain pelting down on us we won't be able to hear ourselves think
Is he in league with you know who? ShockGrin
MurderAtTheBeautyPageant · 11/03/2022 10:38

Hence, most of us in Northern Ireland do not call the south "Ireland". We're NOT one country and calling it "Ireland" does make outsiders think they are.

Who cares.

The country is called Ireland. Your whining about that doesn't change a thing.

I don't know any Irish people who refer to the Republic of Ireland outside of a footballing context.

yodaforpresident · 11/03/2022 10:43

@MargaretBall and yet for the Olympics there is Team GB emblazoned everywhere and indeed that is the official name of the UK team..........

MargaretBall · 11/03/2022 10:49

Yoda, en.as.com/en/2021/07/23/olympic_games/1626996896_821445.html this explains it . As an aside, If you’re from NI you can also choose to either represent Ireland or U.K. .

PerkingFaintly · 11/03/2022 10:54

"Russia loves putting its diplomatic knife into that crack and wiggling."

Sweetmayday · 11/03/2022 10:54

RTE have a show called Prime Time, I was watching it last night and they were on about it. What they had planned to build was huge, 3 3 storey buildings with underground rooms and
2 other seperate buildings as apartments for staff.They would have had their own independent water supply and petrol supply, so if the Irish water system was contaminated they would not be impacted. Also they show raised concerns about the amount of people employed by the Russian embassy, 30 Russian nationals compared to the 4 Irish nationals in the Irish embassy in Moscow. It's the second largest embassy after America.

MurderAtTheBeautyPageant · 11/03/2022 10:54

@SunscreenCentral

I'm shook that Eoghan Murphy, Minister for Absolutely No Housing, Like None actually managed to do ONE useful thing in his political life before he slid back under a rock "moved on" to new pastures
Consider me also shook.
yodaforpresident · 11/03/2022 10:55

Oh, I know that you can represent either side, I'm just surprised that the DUP didn't kick up more of a fuss about being excluded (visually anyway). I know NI is included in the team name but who is going to look at that when it's referred to everywhere as Team GB.