Will the Taoiseach and his European colleagues stop soft-pedalling or, worse, bending the knee before Donald Trump, and finally admit what everybody can see and what some of us have been saying for some time, which is that Trump is a bully, an imperialist, and a threat to the world and to humanity? Will they admit that it is time to stand up to this bully and call him out for what he is? His list of crimes, threats and bullying is too long to enumerate but let us give some of the highlights. He armed a genocide. He gave billions to Israel to carry out a genocide over two years, then invited Netanyahu, an indicted war criminal, to a New Year's Eve party in his mansion in Mar-a-Lago. The Taoiseach mentioned Putin and what a threat he is.

Trump has now put Putin, an indicted war criminal, on the Board of Peace for Gaza, along with Blair, one of the major architects of the Iraq War, which claimed the lives of 1 million people, and, of course, Netanyahu and Israel, the people who perpetrated the genocide, will be on the Board of Peace as well. He has attacked Venezuela and kidnapped the President and his wife. Whatever the Taoiseach thinks about that regime, and I do not think much of it, he has no right to attack that regime. Trump has defended the execution of a 36-year-old mother and writer, Renée Good, by ICE agents, and has sent paramilitary forces into the cities of America to attack people of colour and immigrants. He has threatened Colombia, Mexico, Cuba, Canada and Iran. He pretended he was interested in Ukraine because of the warmongering of Putin, which clearly is not true but actually exposed that what he wanted was the rare earth minerals from Ukraine.

He is threatening an economic war and trade war that is driving up the cost of living for working class people in America and threatens to do the same to hard-pressed working class people across the world. To add to it all, his pal is Elon Musk, who profits from selling child abuse material and misogynistic material on the Internet. The disgusting list goes on.

He admits that his strategy is imperialist in the national security strategy, which states that the US "will assert political, economic and military power over the Western Hemisphere." He quotes the Monroe Doctrine, which was used to justify interventions in Nicaragua, Bolivia, Panama, Ecuador, and in Iran and Iraq in the 1950s. The Taoiseach can go through the list. Will the Taoiseach stand up to the bully? He is not seriously going to go to the White House with shamrock this year and celebrate our national day with them. Surely he is going to tell US troops to get out of Shannon Airport and he is not going to go along with the militarisation agenda that Trump is urging on Europe.

As I said earlier, we are in a very serious situation. Our national interest, quite frankly, is to protect Irish workers. We will behave accordingly to do that and to achieve that, and to make sure that we can get a reasonable international legal framework through the UN to get countries to adhere to the international rule of law. The world is in a very bad place. Thousands and thousands of people are losing their lives all over the world. I have referred to Ukraine, for example. Europe worked with the US. Why? Deputy Boyd Barrett condemns Russia, correctly so, but what has stopped Russia from taking over Ukraine in its entirety? Let us be honest. What has stopped it? The Deputy might not like to admit it.

Not Trump.

US firepower and US intelligence have, along with others in the European Union and the United Kingdom. That is the reality. If the Deputy wants to abandon all of that, that is fine. I agree with the Deputy in the sense that I do not agree with spheres of influence. I do not agree with the Monroe Doctrine but the Deputy is suggesting that we open up to that. I do not think he means it but those are the implications. Russia takes Ukraine and Moldova. Is that what we want? Iran does what it does.

I mean, when we discuss the Middle East in this House, I never hear criticism of Iran - never.

Check the record.

No, no. In terms of the malign influence Iran has had in the Middle East, with Hezbollah, Hamas and - you name it - the Houthis in terms of trade routes and the economy, we never hear it really to any great extent or to any consistent extent. We are now hearing from Iran, potentially, that 4,000 citizens have been murdered, and up to 12,000 could have been murdered, because we do not know with the Internet blackout and so on like that. It is very difficult for citizens in Iran who want to adhere to the principles of freedom of association and freedom of speech. In Sudan, thousands and thousands have lost their lives in horrendous situations, with other external powers also being influential and negatively impactful on the lives of ordinary people in Sudan. We can go elsewhere in terms of violations of international law and so forth.

Our guiding light is and has to be adherence to the international rule of law and to the United Nations, as imperfect as it is. I agree with António Guterres that the Security Council is long outdated, with the post-Second World War scenario there in terms of the powers that are on the Security Council.

I thank the Taoiseach. I call Deputy Boyd Barrett.

This is a broader issue that affects the entire globe and many malign actors are involved.

I thank the Taoiseach. Deputy Boyd Barrett to respond.