Sir - I am writing on behalf of the silent and forgotten Yugoslav region of Montenegro, which has been bombed by NATO although it has maintained its autonomous status in spite of intense provocation. Some 15 per cent of the population are Kosovar refugees. Montenegro is extremely poor: 80 per cent unemployment, 50 per cent on social welfare.
Imagine 65,000 refugees arriving, with nothing, in a country the size of Leinster.
The president, remaining neutral in this conflict, has no friends - NATO and the US are pouring their billions into Macedonia and Albania. Poor Montenegro has to do it all alone and suffer the indignity of bombing.
In Bar, where Refugee Trust has its office, the chlorine factory was bombed. This has created a huge water chlorination shortage, leaving people to drink contaminated water.
Please stop the bombing in Montenegro.
Refugee Trust is registered as an NGO thanks to Ireland's neutrality. We hope eventually to promote corridors of peace as a protection for the refugees in the Kosovar region who are still there and for others on the move.
It is a complex problem, but we can only remind NATO that it said that this war was not against the people of Yugoslavia but against the war machine of Milosevic. Let it maintain that by not upsetting the delicate balance in Montenegro. - Yours, etc.
Norman Fitzgerald, C.S.Sp., Executive Director Refugee Trust, Stillorgan, Co Dublin.