Sir, - John Hume was right when he said of the multi-party talks that there should be "no guns on the table, under the table or outside the door". Unfortunately his warning was not heeded and the negotiations were conducted under the constant threat, and practice, of terrorist violence. The result is a document which has absolutely no validity and on the basis of which, without even accepting it, the terrorists and their quasi-political representatives are demanding the release of prisoners, the disbandment of the RUC, etc., without their having relinquished as much as a peashooter. And they are determined never to do so. - Yours, etc.,
Don Heenan,
Willianstown, Rathvilly, Co Carlow.