Madam, - I am surprised at the outrage being expressed by a small number of commentators about the Government's recent economic mission to Saudi Arabia. While the medieval proclivities of the Saudi aristocracy are offensive to intelligent people, we should not condemn our politicians for doing their job. They went to that benighted kingdom to increase our collective wealth.
Morality has no place in how our politicians garner and sustain our wealth. They must do all that they can to satisfy the economic demands of the 40 per cent of voters who will put them in power at the next election. Not a single vote will be changed due to a party in power being amoral in its international relations. We will vote with our hands and minds on our wallets.
A consistently moral approach to how we conduct our economic relationships would be at best impractical and at worst disastrous. The list of countries with which we would have to sever ties is long. We would have to shun all those nations which permit capital punishment, torture, political repression and institutional discrimination. The US, China, Russia, nearly every Muslim country in the world, large swathes of Africa and central Asia would all have to be denied "the opportunity" to do business with us.
It would be even worse if we took this morality to its natural conclusion. We would have to cut off ties with those countries which insisted on doing business with nations we were being righteous about. That would mean doing business with no one ever again. So while the Government was crass and ignorant in exposing Irish women to the absurd perversions of Saudi society, it should not be condemned for trying to make some money from these tyrants. - Yours, etc,
PAUL BOWLER, The Bridge, Lixnaw, Co Kerry.