Madam, – Richard Greene (September 7th) is incorrect when he suggests that the European Court of Justice will be able to, or indeed has a desire to, overrule the Irish position on abortion. It is important to note that, in the 36 years since Ireland became a member of the European Union, not one single piece of EU law has sought to change our position, or indeed the position of any of the five EU member-states that place restrictions on abortion.
Mr Greene mentions the protocol attached to the Maastricht Treaty, which has “served us well” by ensuring that the EU cannot change our position on this issue. The protocol specifies that any decision to change the law on abortion must be made by the Irish people. However, Mr Greene neglects to mention that this protocol on abortion is reproduced, word for word, in the Treaty of Lisbon.
It is disheartening to see Cóir again resorting to an emotive, but irrelevant, topic of concern in an effort to cloud the issue. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – "Ice queen", "pin-up girl", "board of governors of a posh Swiss finishing school", the suggestion that "ordinary women" couldn't possibly be stylish – this is what passes for coverage of a Women for Europe event in Kilkenny in your edition of September 7th. I don't know what is more astonishing: that an Irish Timesjournalist managed to fit so many sexist stereotypes into one 250-word article, or that you saw fit to print it. – Yours, etc,
Madam,– Your paper recently reported a public talk by Tom Arnold, as CEO of Concern, in which he advocated voting Yes for Lisbon (Home News, August 24th). I take great exception to him using his position with Concern to promote a particular political agenda. People of all political persuasions and social backgrounds support this worthwhile charity and it is from the base of such support that he speaks.
I have withdrawn the pittance from my pension that I had allocated to Concern in protest at his actions and hope others may consider what they might do to draw attention to this unacceptable display of the abuse of power. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – It seems that Tony Kinsella (Opinion, September 7th) is giving us an ethical injunction to vote Yes on the Lisbon Treaty based on the hundreds and thousands of deaths witnessed under Hitler’s Nazi regime, to which he has reasoned that Ireland’s neutrality is in part responsible. Of course, this is not quantifiable and lies under a “what if?” as Kinsella reminds us.
However, he continues to list off figures of mass genocide, rhetorically asking us, “Were the incinerated of Dresden also a price worth paying?” Unfortunately, the morality of modern conflict is slightly more ambiguous than the old Democracy versus Nazism dyad, and is slightly harder to categorise under Good versus Evil.
The future conquests of the Lisbon Treaty’s “Battlegroups” are not in any sense ethically bound, and to advocate military action over neutrality rests wholly in the specifics of that action and not under some universal ethic. A call to arms against Hitler might have been clear enough, but today’s war on terrorism is a little less certain.
Article 28 of the Lisbon Treaty gives the EU the power “to fight terrorism, including supporting third countries in combating terrorism”. What if this third country is America in need of support invading Iran, or Syria, under its self-proclaimed war on terror? An injunction to vote Yes on the Lisbon Treaty based the deaths of the second World War is seriously unethical, as nearly all modern conflict adheres primarily to politico-economic factors, devoid of Kinsella’s romantic sense of Good versus Evil. – Yours, etc,