Sir, - Breda O'Brien (Opinion, December 16th) rightly pointed out the serious democratic deficit within the European Union. She also did well to remind us of the manner in which each member state advances its own economic interest with extreme selfishness.
However, the suggestion that "a better alternative" for some of the applicant counties "might be to form closer alliances with other East European countries which are at a similar level of development" is, I would suggest, irrelevant to their fundamental needs.
Ms O'Brien does not refer to the fact that all of the European Union applicant countries are extremely anxious to enter the Union as soon as possible, despite the inevitable sacrifices involved. She must know that many of them are desperately poor and facing great social instability. This is a breeding ground for new fascist regimes which, as in the case of former Yugoslavia, readily turn on their weaker neighbours in order to shore up support.
The dominant inspiration of the EU was to promote peace and stability on the European continent after the second World War. The major European Powers carry a great responsibility for the enslavement of Eastern Europe by their failure to confront Hitler at the appropriate time, which led, via the second World War, to the occupation of Eastern Europe by the Soviet Union. After their similar failure to withstand the fascist regime of Slobodan Milosevic for most of the past decade, there is surely an imperative moral and political need to speed up, rather than delay, the accession of Eastern Europe into the EU.
Such early accession offers real hope of Bosnia being effectively reunited, following its ruthless destruction by the fascist regimes of Milosevic in Serbia and of Tudjman in Croatia.
The current reality is that, despite all the rhetoric about accession for new countries into the EU, there is a huge temptation to maintain the exploitation of those countries as sources of cheap labour and as export markets. As a country that was colonised for centuries, Ireland should take a lead in opposing the continued impoverishment and exploitation of other vulnerable countries within Europe. -Yours, etc.,
Valerie Hughes, Rathmines, Dublin 6.