Sir, - Niall O'Dowd appears to be suggesting that, because a large number of those murdered at the World Trade Centre were of Irish ancestry, Irish people should not criticise the United States' war in Afghanistan.
Ironically, most of the inhumanity plaguing the Earth originates in the pernicious presumption that a person is obliged to think only what is acceptable to the parish, nationality or race into which he or she is born. We will have fewer terrorist atrocities and Afghan wars only when more people adopt James Joyce's advice to escape from the nets of nationalism and religion and think freely for themselves. - Yours, etc.,
John K. Collins, Waterhouse Bay, Winnipeg, Canada.