Peace hopes take a battering

The shooting down by missile last week over the Ukraine of a commercial passenger flight from Amsterdam international airport to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, with some of the passengers en route to Australia, is serious for the safety of international flights as the airline believed it was safe to fly on the usual route over the Ukraine and the plane was 1,000 feet above the danger zone.

Passengers on commercial flights are usually exempt from attack in war situations which have nothing to do with them, and if this were to happen again where a commercial flight were to be targeted, it would make global air travel more dangerous.

The US ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, said there can be no hiding place within a UN member state for those who carried out the attack. Eighty of the 298 on board were children.

Passengers were from the Netherlands, Australia, Malaysia and seven other countries.

They could have been you or me going on holiday or heading home after a holiday. One hundred and eight of the passengers were among the world’s experts in medical research into HIV and were to attend a conference in Australia.

They had dedicated their lives to saving life, not ending it. One of them was said to be a kind man and a true humanitarian.

One family lost two relatives on the flight and also lost two relatives on another flight with the same airline that went mysteriously off-course in March into the deep Indian Ocean and never found with all the passengers believed dead, leading to one of the world’s puzzling aviation mysteries.

The international community don’t appear able to really respond, because when events like this occurs nowadays in international conflicts, whether in the Ukraine or the Middle East, these happen so fast and it is more complex to solve.

In September 1978, the famous Camp David Peace Agreement was signed by Egypt and Israel and it has held for 36 years, but there were not many fighting groups in the Middle East as today. When he signed the peace treaty, president Anwar Sadat of Egypt said it was the happiest day of his life. He was killed in Egypt shortly after.

It has been difficult in the last few years for peace to take a hold as violent conflict has spread within countries important to peace in the Middle East, causing a refugee crisis to which charities, including our own Goal and Unicef Ireland, have given assistance.

M Sullivan

College Road

Cork