BAY LOFTUS,
Sir, - Whatever about Fintan O'Toole shedding no tears for the Wolfe Tones (News Features, January 19th), they did highlight the Rockall issue.
The dispute about the ownership of Rockall Island is not a non-issue, as Mr O'Toole says. We are talking about the Rockall Plateau, an area 400 miles by 600 miles off Co Donegal where strong evidence of oil and minerals was discovered 2km deep following a joint survey by scientists from Cambridge University and the National Institute of Oceanography in September 1969.
The British Government hijacked Rockall by landing troops on it, even though it is 31.15km closer to Donegal than to Inverness. It then enacted the Island of Rockall Act on February 10th 1972. This states that Rockall is now part of Inverness, Scotland.
Iceland and Denmark have lodged claims to their share of whatever oil and minerals there are in the Rockall Plateau. Successive Irish Governments have refused to lodge a legal counter-claim, despite repeated requests from myself and the late John O'Halloran of the National Co-Operative Council of Ireland - Yours, etc.,
SÉAN DUBLIN BAY LOFTUS,
Chairman,
Ireland's Rockall Trust,
Seafield Avenue,
Dublin 3.