Madam, - Dr Rory Miller (Opinion & Analysis, March 28th) calls on the Irish Government to demand a Syrian retreat from Lebanon. In so doing, he deliberately omits at least two salient facts.
Firstly, the Syrian occupation was backed by the US and its Western cohorts as a means of maintaining "stability" in Lebanon after its bloody civil war. Now that US neo-conservatives feel they no longer have need of this crutch, it has again become politic to demonise Syria.
Secondly, in 1967 Israel illegally occupied and subsequently illegally annexed the Syrian Golan Heights. To demand Syria's retreat from Lebanon without simultaneously calling for an Israeli withdrawal from Syrian territory is to display an egregious double standard such as can only deepen justified Arab resentments.
There is no doubt that Syria should leave Lebanon, just as there is no doubt that all occupations in the region (and elsewhere) should end. - Yours, etc.,
RAYMOND DEANE, Chair, Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Dublin 1.