DEAR BILLY

Dear Billy

I am writing to urge you to end the bombing campaign on Libya and to pursue a peaceful resolution to the current conflict.

Colonel Gadhafi's dictatorship is a brutal one and civilians are dying and suffering, but nothing will come of further bloodshed. Violence simply begets more violence. The US, Britain and NATO are clearly not adequately testing offers for a truce and supervised elections.

Rather than descending to the use of brute force, a humanitarian intervention requires a permanent, well-equipped UN peace-keeping force and effective international courts to prevent massacres and mass brutalities. Surely this should be high on the agenda of all civilized nations.

I seriously wonder how a government mired in recession and debt, intent on savage cuts to public services, can continue to attempt to police the world with interventions of this nature.

Yours sincerely

Fireseed