Sir, - Lest it be thought that the announcement of severe budget cuts to the Anglo-Irish section of the Department of Foreign Affairs (The Irish Times, November 12th) goes unnoticed, let me protest. Let me protest as an act of faith, despite the evidence, that words still mean what they say. Rather than go the way of the fatalist or cynic, let me rail against the announcement, for it undermines an explicit Government commitment in the Good Friday Agreement. I do believe - help my unbelief - that paragraph 13 of that Agreement did mean what it said in pledging its "continuing support" and "enhanced government assistance" for organisations which play a "vital role in consolidating peace" and in developing "reconciliation, mutual understanding and respect between and within communities and traditions, in Northern Ireland and between North and South." Did someone, somewhere change the script? Was 13 a doomed paragraph number? Let me rage against the dying of the light. - Yours, etc., Geraldine Smyth,
Director, Irish School of Ecumenics, Milltown Park, Dublin 6.