Madam, - It is clear from the outpouring of self-righteous indignation on your Letters page concerning the Northern peace process that there is a whole constituency out there whose needs are not being met. We, the middle-class newspaper readers and radio listeners of the South of Ireland, are truly the unrecognised victims of the past 30 years.
I know that for most of those years we kept our heads down, minimised our exposure, and more or less pretended that it wasn't happening - but that doesn't mean we weren't damaged by it. When we voted for the Good Friday Agreement no one warned us that "terms and conditions" applied.
Surely we have the right to maintain our dignified indifference - and anyway, what about our pain? - Yours, etc.,
MIKE SCOTT, Foster Place North, Ballybough, Dublin 3.
Madam, - Rev Ian Paisley is insisting on multiple visual images of IRA arms destruction, but the IRA leaders have refused to have photographs taken and released. In addition, they are suggesting that a clergyman be present to witness the event.
I should have thought the solution is obvious: blindfold Rev Paisley, take him to the secret place where the arms are stored, remove the blindfold and let him witness the destruction of the arms in person.
Surely he will believe the evidence of his own eyes and be satisfied. No photographs need be taken and no face need be lost on either side. I know this is a radical solution, but I make it in all seriousness. Many lives and the future of the people of this island are at stake. - Yours, etc.,
DES MacHALE, Blackrock, Cork.
Madam, - The entire population of Ireland is now aware of how close we are to a final solution to the 35-year war in this country. It appears that success or failure depends now on whether photographic evidence of disarmament should be made public or whether four prisoners, imprisoned for killing of Garda Jerry McCabe, should be released from Ireland's only four-star prison.
The answers to both of these, now critical, problems lie entirely in the hands of the Army Council of the IRA. In the interests of a final settlement of a horrific period of Irish history I would suggest to them that satisfactory evidence of disarmament be provided to assuage the fears of all peace-loving people and convince them that the gun has finally been taken out of Irish politics. In the case of the prisoners, I would suggest that they themselves, even at this late stage, offer to serve out their sentences, or be ordered to do so by the Commanding Officer of the IRA.
Should the peace talks fail again because the IRA rejects both these proposals, then Sinn Féin-IRA will have much to answer for to the people of Ireland for the uncertain future which will lie ahead in this country. The people of all Ireland demand peace. - Yours, etc.,
OLIVER SMYTH, Rosses Point, Sligo.
Madam, - I have nothing but sympathy for Mrs Anne McCabe and the situation in which she now finds herself.
However, as Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern may now be faced with the unenviable choice of peace in Northern Ireland or the continued imprisonment of the McCabe killers.
The release of the McCabe killers will neither be an easy nor a popular decision; unfortunately, sometimes that is what leadership requires.
It is Sinn Féin which has made this a point of principle to keep the peace process alive.
There now two parties in Ireland which claim the mantle of republicanism. Over the past month one of them, Fianna Fáil, has united its followers under the banner of increased pensions, child benefit and taking those on the minimum wage out of the tax net.
The other, Sinn Féin, unites its people under the demand of freedom for the murderers of Jerry McCabe. The choice of which kind of republicanism should lead Ireland could not be clearer. - Yours, etc.,
Cllr TIERNAN BRADY, (Fianna Fáil), Bundoran, Co Donegal.
Madam, - The sensitivity of Sinn Féin/IRA in relation to providing photographic evidence of the destruction of illegal armaments contrasts with their own calculated publication of photographs of their Dáil representatives with the killers of Det Garda Jerry Mc Cabe. That gratuitous act revealed a contempt for the McCabe family, the Garda Síochána and the moral and legal prohibition on murder. - Yours, etc.,
SEAN McDONAGH, Bettyglen, Raheny, Dublin 5.
Madam, - In response to the IRA's fear of humiliation by Ian Paisley, I would like to quote the wise words of John McCloy:
"Humility leads to strength and not to weakness. It is the highest form of self-respect to admit mistakes and to make amends for them." - Yours, etc.,
ANTHONY BURKE, Hazelbury Park, Dublin 15.