Like David Quinn, I can never understand our governments’ — any of them — attitude to Taiwan (“We bowed to Beijing but Taipei had the answer”, Comment, last week). When I first visited Taiwan in 1983, it was emerging from military rule. Today it is a fully functioning democracy with free elections, independent press and judiciary, strong human-rights protections and independent universities. This is all in sharp contrast to the “mainland”.

Yet our government adopts the harshest anti-Taiwan policy of any EU country, for fear of causing the slightest annoyance to China. It’s time for a rethink.

Maurice Manning, Dublin 4

Open and shut case

This was a good and balanced article by Quinn. It makes you wonder how open Ireland is to