Madam, - We were surprised and disturbed by your publication (August 11th) of an article by Lord Laird which contained a number of untrue and damaging remarks concerning the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ).
Madam, - We were surprised and disturbed by your publication (August 11th) of an article by Lord Laird which contained a number of untrue and damaging remarks concerning the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ).
CAJ is an independent civil liberties organisation which works to ensure that the rights of all in Northern Ireland are respected and protected. Our membership is drawn from across the community. We have worked very hard and very successfully over the years to establish a reputation as an entirely non-sectarian and non-aligned organisation.
This reputation has been very widely recognised, most notably by the member-states of the Council of Europe (including the United Kingdom and Ireland), which awarded their Human Rights Prize to CAJ in 1998. Remarks of the kind published by you are gravely damaging to that hard-won reputation.
Our concern is with human rights, especially as laid down in various international treaties and declarations. If we criticise the British government, it is on account of aspects of their policies which we feel infringe human rights standards and because it is the government which has responsibility for affairs in Northern Ireland.
We understand that this may not always be a popular position. However, it is our view (and one endorsed by the signatories to the Good Friday Agreement) that the protection of human rights is central to building a society in Northern Ireland which respects difference and which is based on the proper application of the rule of law.
It is somewhat depressing that five years after the Agreement not everyone seems to have understood or accepted the principles on which such a society should be built. - Yours, etc.,
MARTIN O'BRIEN, Director, Committee on the Administration of Justice, Donegall Street, Belfast 1.