IRA Murder of British M.P. Ian Gow

Your editorial “Don’t Add to IRA Murders” (Aug. 1) is so biased that I wonder if The Times is a British-owned newspaper! Instead of parroting English propaganda, allow your readers to hear the other side:

1) The Irish Republican Brotherhood, forerunner of the IRA, fought England on Irish soil in 1916, which led to the Republic of Ireland.

2) In 1918, the last time an all-Ireland election was permitted by England, the overwhelming majority voted for a united Ireland.

3) In 1922, England divided the historic province of Ulster to create and insure a “statelet” loyal to the crown.

4) Since its inception, British-run Northern Ireland has discriminated against the Nationalist minority; unemployment in some of areas reaches 80%, while Nationalists are subject to arrest without charge, imprisonment without trial and are targets, military or not, of British soldiers and Ulster Loyalists that have a “license to kill.”

5) The latest poll shows the majority of English voters want a military withdrawal from Northern Ireland, and that although the British government has said it could never win militarily against the IRA, its current losses of men killed and wounded are at “acceptable levels.”

6) Many world organizations, led by Amnesty International, have documented British atrocities in Northern Ireland and have called for Irish self-determination.

Is it necessary to enumerate all the countries that have fought for and won independence from England, and that Ireland is fighting for the same thing?

MARSH PERRY

Sherman Oaks