Sir, - Recently I evoked some interest through the columns of your paper concerning the issue of rights for minority groups and the Belfast Agreement as it affects the Irish Republic.
I am amazed at the volume of contacts that I have had from citizens of the Irish Republic alleging political and/or religious discrimination. This type of allegation would be taken more seriously were it to occur in my country where such discrimination is illegal. These allegations underline the need for the Irish Government to play its full part in implementing the Belfast Agreement by bringing its standards of human rights up to those available in Northern Ireland. Nearly three years after the agreement, there is no sign of such a development.
I have become distressed at the nature of some of the allegations and am now considering compiling a dossier of such alleged abuses which I will then present to Mary Robinson, the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights. If the Belfast Agreement is to mean anything, it means total equality and parity of esteem and development of human rights throughout the island of Ireland. The implications for one party, in this case the Irish Government, not implementing its part of the agreement would be immense for the future of the agreement as well as not acceptable in modern society. - Yours, etc.,
Lord Laird, of Artigarvan, House of Lords, London SW1.