Madam, - The tragedy of Beslan resulted in scores of young children dying in bloody mayhem exacerbated by days of deliberate and cruel drinking water deprivation. In Falluja, where the Red Cross/Crescent has deliberately been prevented from bringing in drinking water and other relief, it seems inevitable that hundreds if not thousands of children and innocents will have died bloodily and from thirst. The difference? - Deafening silence from governments like our own and the fact that the perpetrators of the large-scale atrocity profess (don't they?) values such as democracy, freedom, and respect for human rights.
Or perhaps Muslim children in oil-rich areas don't have any human rights? - Yours, etc.,
CLAIRE WHEELER, Oaklands Park, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.
Madam, - For the purposes of staging the eagerly awaited democratic elections in Iraq this coming January the US-backed administration may need to provide some new prefabricated buildings. These could be erected in Falluja and Mosul to act as temporary polling stations, as by that time there may be no other suitable buildings left standing in those cities.
Citizens who have survived the most recent visitations of freedom upon them will surely be appreciative of such efforts in enabling them to exercise their franchise. - Yours, etc.,
ARTHUR DUNNE, Blackrock, Co Dublin.