LETTER: Brexit a great imperial withdrawal symptom

SIR – Nick Turner’s letter regarding the European Union (April 13^th) wraps its message in a fog of innuendo and questionmarks, but the purpose is clear – to present the Brexiteer message emanating from the lunatic fringe of the British Conservative Party.

This includes the familiar xenophobia: we are warned of the ultimate horror of being ruled by ‘Portuguese, Greeks or Bulgarians’ – lesser breeds who don’t speak English. Another give-away is the quaint fantasy that the EU is a sinister socialist conspiracy – are you listening, Jeremy Corbyn?

The real EU is a coming-together of independent states co-operating as equals to resolve common problems and interests. For those in Britain who still think that international issues are best decided by sending a gunboat and organising a massacre or two, the notion of co-operating as an equal is apparently incomprehensible.

Brexit is the great imperial withdrawal symptom. Only one other European country still suffers from that painful complaint – Russia, which now boasts the Crimea as its equivalent of Northern Ireland, and rightly sees the EU as a dangerously democratic model of international relations.

This part of the world has welcomed numerous discerning Britons who have chosen to live here, with obvious benefits for everyone. I doubt if many of them share Mr Turner’s ludicrous and irrelevant opinions.

S O’Mahony,

Gurteennakilla,

Ballydehob.