Sir, - It would, indeed, have been much better if the UN rather than NATO had the leading role in dealing with the Kosovan crisis. However, it is clear to anybody paying close attention to the media over the past decade that Russia continually used its veto to obstruct effective consensual intervention against ethnic cleansing by Serbian forces in the former Yugoslavia.
Moreover, Russia has a long history of massive deportation, systematic rape and mass killings in dealing with its ethnic minority populations of Muslims, Jews, Siberians, Caucasians, Tartars, and "dissidents". Under Stalin, an estimated 30 million people perished.
Unlike defeated Germany after the second World War, triumphant Russia was never forced to search its own soul for such awful large-scale atrocities. Little wonder that the Russians' kin and allies, the Serbs, perceive that there is a precedent for getting away with such unacceptable conduct. - Yours, etc., Dr Michael M. Delmonte,
Trafalgar Terrace, Monkstown, Co. Dublin.