Sir, – Will some concerned councillor now propose to rename Fitzwilliam Square East as “Independent Yemen Square East”, given that it is the home of the Saudi Arabian embassy, whose government has waged a brutal war on the people of Yemen for the last seven years that has caused the deaths of 377,000 people, including tens of thousands of women and children, and has displaced and created famine conditions for millions of Yemenis?
Will a councillor call for Pembroke Road to be renamed “Independent Palestine Road” or will some Independent TD propose, the next time that Gaza is being bombarded by the Israeli military, that we send arms from the Curragh to the besieged Palestinians so they can defend their homeland? An 11-year-old child in Gaza has witnessed four devastating wars in its short life.
The double standards being shown by political leaders, including here in Ireland, and so much of the western media in relation to Ukraine and other ongoing wars are truly galling.
The best way to help the people of Ukraine and Yemen is to demand an immediate ceasefire, diplomatic engagement and peaceful negotiations between the belligerents while ensuring massive humanitarian aid to help the refugees.
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Meanwhile western leaders arm and train the Saudi military to drop bombs on Yemeni civilians, show disdain for peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, while openly warmongering with Putin, all while starving the people of Afghanistan.
Why is the Government not demanding ceasefires and peace talks at the UN Security Council?
The desperate people of Ukraine and Yemen equally deserve peace, security and freedom from what are ultimately proxy wars between major imperial power blocs. – Yours, etc,
JIM ROCHE,
Irish Anti-War Movement,
Dublin 1.
Sir, – Isolation and sanctions will negatively impact on the Russian economy but that won’t compensate the Ukrainian people for the killings and malevolent destruction of their cities, towns and villages.
The 141 UN countries that condemned Putin’s war of aggression must now insist that reparations – down to the last kopek – be paid to Ukraine.
The war is getting ever more destructive, so Russian people need to be told now that their financial debt is growing by the day and the sooner this murderous devastation stops the better for all concerned. – Yours, etc,
GUS GERAGHTY,
Dalkey,
Co Dublin.
Sir, – While it is very gratifying to see the huge and generous response by our Government to the refugee crisis, we must not neglect the perilous state of our security.
This country has been left defenceless for many years by the utterly immoral idea that others should pay in money and lives for our security while we neglect to build up any sort of adequate military ourselves. We have no military allies and seem to have been labouring under the delusion that EU membership was sufficient for our security.
I believe that Nato membership is now urgent.
If that needs a referendum, then so be it. The idea that such a vital matter be offloaded to a citizens’ assembly, as mentioned by the Taoiseach, would be risible were it not such a dereliction of duty. The first duty of any State is to protect its citizens in a timely manner and our State has failed to do that. Our neutrality has not served us well, as various commentators point out, or if it has, that has only been by selfishly letting others make the sacrifices from which we have benefited. It has been a morally bankrupt, self-serving posture of virtue signalling. – Yours, etc,
PETER DALY,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.
Sir, – Bread is a powerful weapon and may yet decide the fate of Ukraine. War there has meant its grain will not be sold this year. Sanctions on Russia will reduce grain and fertiliser supply further. Global supply could be reduced by more than 30 per cent. Both nations are major suppliers to the Middle East and north Africa. Loss there means economic migration to Europe. As before, these migrants will mostly be male, but will they be received as the mostly women and children of Ukraine have been? Not likely.
The war in Ukraine may not come to the rest of Europe but, as with climate change, its gathering consequences cannot be avoided. EU governments are to deal with pressures not seen since the aftermath of the second World War.
The humanitarian crisis on the EU’s eastern border could soon be joined by another on the southern. Inflation will continue to rise, as will the costs of heat, energy and housing; so too the demands made on medical and social services. Anger, frustration and jingoism will also rise. All this will test the resolve of European society and values. But none perhaps more than its food supply. Here Europe must be most vigilant. People can endure much privation but history has too often shown civil society broken apart by the lack of bread. The EU and its people must now hold their nerve as Ukraine and its people have so courageously shown us how. We owe them that much. – Yours, etc,
BRIAN FALTER,
Ballyshannon,
Co Donegal.
Sir, – The bombing of a maternity hospital and a children’s hospital by Russian forces in Mariupol is a crime against humanity.
A mechanism must be urgently found by the member states in the European Union or Nato to make the skies safe with a no-fly zone as President Zelensky has repeatedly pleaded for. If this doesn’t happen, there will be more atrocities like this.
Meanwhile, there are thousands of women in Ukraine whose babies are due in the coming days, weeks, and months.
The risks posed by war to women who are pregnant are immense. Women who can’t get to hospital are delivering in cellars and bomb-shelters; those who manage to get there run the risk of being killed or injured by bombs, along with their babies. A maternity hospital near Kyiv was also recently hit by a Russian missile.
There is an urgent need for safe passage to be provided for women in Ukraine who are pregnant and who need to leave, as well as for those who have recently delivered, and for their babies.
Furthermore, there is an urgent need for European countries to accommodate these women and babies, and to provide immediate access to healthcare services and all necessary supports.
This should be an important part of Ireland’s humanitarian response. – Yours, etc,
CHRIS FITZPATRICK,
(Retired consultant
obstetrician and
gynaecologist),
Dublin 6.
Sir, – The Russian invasion of a peaceful sovereign state must surely be decried by all reasonable people. May I suggest that all who support the Ukrainian people in their struggle wear something blue and yellow this St Patrick’s Day. We can show our support everywhere that this day is celebrated, worldwide! – Yours, etc,
ANDREW WALLACE.
Ballacolla,
Co Laois.
Sir, – By all means necessary, the people of Ireland should provide humanitarian aid, a safe harbour and accommodation to other nations in times of war and crisis, but we also have an obligation not to step over our brothers and sisters sleeping on the streets on a cold night in order to do so.
History will judge us for seeing hardship and trauma outside our borders but not in our homes and families. – Yours, etc,
LISA BUTTERLY,
Blackrock,
Co Louth.
Sir, – These pages have been inundated in recent days with letters calling for us to ditch our neutrality and sign up to Nato or a militarised EU.
I wonder how many of these correspondents, who seem prepared to send out our young men and women to kill and be killed, would themselves be prepared to practise what they preach and fight in the Ukraine right now, and if not why not? – Yours, etc,
RICHARD BARRETT,
Dublin 6.
Sir, – For a person who has strongly defended Ireland’s neutrality, it is difficult to stand by and see a European country being torn apart by a country that has for the second time in a decade engaged in an unprovoked assault and war crimes.
It is no longer feasible, politically acceptable or tactically smart for the West to stand back and allow a dictatorial tyrant walk over values that have been so well-established post-1945. And it’s important that Ireland thinks hard over where and with whom it stands now. This is our defining moment. – Yours, etc,
ODRAN REID
Glasnevin,
Dublin 11.