Madam, - Martin McGuinness's brazen assertion that the IRA had nothing to do with the recent Northern Bank robbery and that the IRA "are not criminals, never were criminals. . .and never will be criminals" (The Irish Times, January 13th) brings the distortion of language to a new level.
Are we to believe that the robbery of a Newry sorting office and the killing of postal worker Frank Kerr was not a crime? Are we to believe that the no-warning Provo bomb which killed nine people in the village of Claudy was not a crime?
Are we to believe that the Adare bank robbery which involved the Provo killing of Garda Jerry McCabe was not a crime?
It is a cliché of effective propaganda that if a lie is repeated often enough it will be believed. Mr McGuinness and his Provo friends are doing very well in this regard. With 10 per cent of the popular vote in the Republic, Sinn Féin/IRA has already shown how gullible and/or ignorant some people are.
Despite the endless lying of Sinn Féin leaders and the ongoing criminal activities of their private army there is only a craven silence from most politicians (Michael McDowell being one of the few notable exceptions). The Catholic Church also maintains a cowardly silence, using the excuse that these matters are "political", while RTÉ reporters in particular treat Sinn Féin/IRA representatives with a deference that often borders on the disgraceful.
The lack of moral courage in Church and State in facing up to the Provos is one of the most despicable features of contemporary Ireland. Meanwhile the Provos continue their smuggling and other criminal activities while McGuinness & Co inflict more distortions on the English language and on the very essence of truth. - Yours, etc.,
ANTHONY HARTNETT, Bishopstown, Cork.
Madam, - Was I the only person to be disgusted by the attendance of the former Taoiseach Albert Reynolds at the (bogus) centenary celebrations of Provisional Sinn Féin? I really hope, for the integrity and safety of our democracy, that I was not. - Yours, etc.,
Cllr DERMOT LACEY, Beech Hill Drive, Dublin 4.
Madam, - What game was Albert Reynolds playing by attending the Sinn Féin "centenary" celebrations last Friday at the Mansion House?
One would have thought that Fianna Fáil, of which Mr Reynolds was leader, or Fine Gael via Arthur Griffith, would claim to be the true inheritors of Sinn Féin. Maybe those two large parties left a vacuum which is being filled by an organisation that has been responsible for sectarian murder, division and hatred, not to mention criminal acts.
The present organisation has as little claim to bear the true mantle of republicanism, which seeks to unite Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter, as the Lefebvreites have of the mantle of the Church of Rome. - Yours, etc.,
BRENDAN CAFFERTY, Ballina, Co Mayo.
A chara, - Congratulations to Conor Collins (January 12th) on his timely observations about Sinn Féin's cross-border electoral success. However, while it is true that Sinn Féin is the only party with a clear all-Ireland agenda, it is surely naïve to suggest that Sinn Féin voters have "chosen to forget or are too young to remember" the party's bloody past.
Irish voters are not stupid, nor are they suffering from amnesia. In truth, the majority of Sinn Féin supporters, like David Smith (January 12th), "just don't care". For some, the party's retrospective justifications of the IRA "war" may even seem mildly principled compared with the self-serving criminal corruption of too many other washed-out political parties.
When these people vote for Sinn Féin, they are fully aware of what doing so implies. This is the real worry for the never-ending peace process, and Irish democracy as a whole. - Is mise,
OLOF GILL, Clare Island, Co Mayo.