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The use of a University of Wales' residential conference centre for Pheasant shooting has been condemned by The League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) who over the last year have led a campaign to have it banned. Under mounting pressure the university has not renewed the shooting licence at Gregynog Hall. This comes after it was revealed under a Freedom of Information request, that 57,000 pheasants had been released for shooting since 2013 while 160 native wild animals, including foxes and corvids, had been killed by gamekeepers to preserve the land for shooting parties.

News from the Celtic League:

Further article (see below) from the Celtic League on training Saudi military in Wales. It  points out past warnings by the Police and Crime Commissioner for North Wales, Arfon Jones and Plaid Cymru MP Jonathan Edwards to the risk posed of training Saudi military pilots at RAF Valley in Anglesey, North Wales: 

TRAINING SAUDIS POSED SECURITY RISK POLICE COMMISSIONER ALLEGED

Plaid Cymru Police and Crime Commissioner for North Wales, Arfon Jones, said four months ago:

On the River Severn (Welsh: Afon Hafren), in the community of Newtown and Llanllwchaiarn (Y Drenewydd a Llanllwchaearn), is the town of Newtown (Y Drenewydd). The local Council has been striving to develop initiatives to look at new and more sustainable ways to manage the town's open spaces. In a pioneering scheme, 130 acres of land have been transferred in to community ownership in a 99 year lease to a community land trust ‘Open Newtown’.

News from the Celtic League:

The Celtic League continue to campaign against the training of Saudi pilots at RAF Valley in Wales.  They can then go on to use this training in actions leading directly to the killing of innocent people in Yemen. They point to the article below, where the Welsh government were already warned of the implications of training Saudi pilots at RAF Valley:

WELSH GOVERNMENT WERE URGED NOT TO TURN A BLIND EYE TO SAUDI TRAINING AT RAF VALLEY (Nation Cymru)

News from the Celtic League:

The Celtic League continue to raise objections to the use of Ronalsway airport in the Isle of Man for military aircraft training. The war planes are based at RAF Valley in Anglesey, Wales. The RAF has trained Saudi military pilots at RAF Valley. As well as the Air Forces of Kuwait, the UAE and other Gulf states which contribute aircrew and planes to support the Saudi led bombing of Yemen. Actions which have been deemed a war crime by UN investigators in August last year. See the Celtic League article below:

News from the Celtic League:

The Celtic League has written a series of articles criticising the use of areas within the Celtic countries being used for military practice. They draw attention (see below) to the compliance of the Manx government in these exercises and the need for the Welsh government to raise objections. The repercussions of the military training, exercises and weapons testing taking place is at present being felt by the killing and maiming of tens of thousands of men, women and children in Yemen by Saudi forces:

It has been confirmed by Ireland's Department of Justice that a plan to provide an accommodation centre for asylum seekers at a disused hotel in Rooskey, Co Leitrim, has been abandoned. Since it was announced that it was to become a reception centre for asylum seekers, the Shannon Key West Hotel has been damaged in two arson attacks over the last three months. The department has said that the decision not to proceed with the project was due to difficulties with the lease agreement between the owners of the hotel, and the operator renting it.

Saint Patrick is the primary patron saint of Ireland and Saint Patrick's Day was oberved yesterday 17 March, which is said to be the date of his death. Celebrated inside and outside Ireland as a religious and cultural holiday, it is also a celebration of Ireland and all things Irish. Patrick was a 5th Century missionary, who came from Roman Britain and first arrived in Ireland as a slave. Patrick tells us he came from an area called Bannevam Taburniae.

‘Only one previous terror attack in country relatively free from such incidents’.

Leaders in the Celtic countries have been swift in their condemnation of a terrorist attack in New Zealand. Both the Irish President, Michael D Higgins, and Manx Chief Minister, Howard Quayle MHK, have issued statements (see links below):

https://www.manxradio.com/news/isle-of-man-news/chief-minister-pays-trib...

The late Nigel Kneale is considered to be the Island's most successful radio, television and film scriptwriter, subsequently immortalised by his creation of the cult BBC TV science fiction series Quatermass during the 1950s. But a rarely heard play entitled The Road, recently aired on BBC Radio 4, revealed another side of his work.

He was born in Dalton in Furness in 1922, but the Kneale family returned to the Isle of Man six years later, when his father, a journalist, joined his brother to run the Mona's Herald.