Sir, - While the condemnation by prominent members of Sinn Fein of the bombing in Omagh is significant, it cannot be allowed to rest there. It is reasonable to assume that many of those involved in the "Real IRA" achieved a level of political consciousness through the rhetoric of people now prominent in Sinn Fein. A party which has refused to condemn the use of violence in the past and which has praised the activities of the IRA is under a special obligation to do everything in its power to impress on the community the unacceptability of the use of violence in the pursuit of a political objective.
This must not be on the basis that the Republican leadership has decided that its objectives are now obtainable by purely democratic means; the essential point is that, even if the Republican agenda could not be forwarded in the new political atmosphere, there can be no justification for violence. Responses to the horror of Omagh become morally fuzzy when viewed in the context of past equivocation over violence. One could be forgiven for thinking that the difference between then and now is that the Republican leadership has simply chosen a different method to pursue its objective - an attitude which would render its condemnation morally vacuous. There can be no justification for political violence in a democracy; and the burden is on those formerly associated with violence to make this clear. - Yours, etc.,
Barry O'Donnell,
Ardagh Drive,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.